


Make Me

by Shazrolane, Taste_is_Sweet



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies), Marvel, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Care and Feeding of Feral Winter Soldiers, Clint Barton Is a Good Bro, Dom Bucky Barnes, Dom Laura Barton, Dom Natasha Romanov, Dom/sub, F/F, F/M, Happy Ending, Hydra are dicks, Light Bondage, M/M, Natasha Romanov Is a Good Bro, OTP: Not Without You, OTP: Till the End of the Line, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Harm, Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Sub Clint Barton, Sub Steve Rogers, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Torture, bucky no
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-04
Updated: 2016-01-04
Packaged: 2018-05-11 15:45:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 53,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5632087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shazrolane/pseuds/Shazrolane, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taste_is_Sweet/pseuds/Taste_is_Sweet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky Barnes was Steve Rogers' Dom since they were teens. But then the War came and Bucky fell, and the Red Room and then Hydra destroyed his protective instincts along with his memory.</p><p>Now Bucky's returned, but he's far from healed. He can barely stand to be in the same room as Steve, let alone make Steve his sub again. With no one to take him in hand, Steve is spiraling out of control, losing himself to desperation and despair.</p><p>Clint Barton can't stand to see his friends suffering, and comes up with a plan to fix it: he'll act as Bucky's sub, until Bucky's able to be a Dom again. Then Bucky can take Steve back.</p><p>It's not the worst idea Clint's ever had, but that doesn't mean it won't end in disaster anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Make Me

**Author's Note:**

> HOVER CURSOR OVER THIS SENTENCE FOR WARNINGS AND POTENTIAL SPOILERS
> 
> The super-sweet [Squeaky](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Squeaky/pseuds/Squeaky) and the awesome [abbeyjewel](http://archiveofourown.org/users/abbeyjewel/pseuds/abbeyjewel) did the betas. Thank you!
> 
> This fic fills the **Forced to Face Fear** square of Taste_is_Sweet's [Hurt/Comfort Bingo](http://hc-bingo.livejournal.com/) [Card](http://taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com/92414.html), and the **Brainwashing/Deprogramming** square of Shazrolane's [Hurt/Comfort Bingo](http://hc-bingo.livejournal.com/) [Card](http://shazrolane.livejournal.com/589.html). Nifty!

Natasha Romanov had never really thought about how many subs were in the Avengers.

It wasn't that she was inobservant; far from it. But after everything they'd all been through as a team, the different dynamics fit together so smoothly that it was easy to stop noticing. Until something disrupted it. Or someone.

In this case, James Buchanan Barnes, who'd just stepped out of the elevator. He had a Starktab under his arm but was still hovering by the doors, as anxious as an alley cat in a dog kennel. It was impossible not to notice.

She looked around now, cataloging everyone as tension seeped subtly into the room. Tony and Bruce were snugged together in one of the loveseats, Starktiming with Pepper on Tony's tablet. Tony had his arm wrapped around Bruce with his hand idly petting his belly under his shirt, laughing at something their Domme said on the screen. Tony seemed completely oblivious to what was going on, but he quietly pulled Bruce closer to him.

Bruce had tensed up immediately, of course, but being aware of potential triggers in his environment could literally mean life or death for anyone around him. He was doing his best to ignore it, though, smiling along with the conversation and plastering himself to Tony's side. At least Pepper would be back by the end of the week, and Tony was a caring and generous Dom when he felt like being one. He could look after Bruce if he needed it. Bruce could also come to Natasha, but he normally only did that when the guilt he constantly carried overwhelmed him.

Jane was engulfed in one of the sumptuous armchairs with Thor kneeling on a cushion at her feet. She was reading a science journal, one hand idly massaging the back of her sub's neck. Thor lifted his head from her thigh to look at Bucky, and Natasha heard Jane murmuring 'shh' to him. He leaned against her again, but he was wary now, too.

Clint, who'd been half-asleep with his head in Natasha's lap, sat up the instant the elevator doors opened, as if he sensed the potential threat before Bucky even came in. Natasha didn't look up from the mission brief she was reading on her tablet, but she slid her hand up to the nape of her sub's neck and into his hair.

"You're safe, sweetheart, you can relax," she said softly in Russian. 

Clint nodded mutely and leaned against her, but Natasha could still feel the tension in his muscles all the way down his side.

"Shall we leave?" she asked him in the same language, and just as softly.

He shook his head. "I'm not worried for me."

Bucky finally left the safety of the elevator, padding the rest of the way to the chairs, cat-silent on his bare feet. He sized up everyone in the room before he purposely chose the empty armchair that happened to be furthest away from the group and closest to the emergency stairway. Natasha remembered what it was like to live like that: the irresistible need to evaluate every situation for threats or targets. That was why he'd been lurking by the elevators. It simultaneously irritated her and made her ache for him.

He'd only been with them for two months; he'd only really remembered who he was for one of them. She knew he needed more time. 

"What'cha reading?" Clint asked Bucky as soon as he settled in the chair, as relaxed as he could ever get.

Bucky had to know he wasn't alone but he startled anyway, head snapping up like a rifle scope. It took him a second to answer. "A history of the Vietnam War," he said. His voice still sounded strange to Natasha, so similar and yet so different from when she'd been with him. He shrugged in that practiced way of his that she was sure he'd perfected long before the war. "I helped start it. So, I figured I should find out what I did."

"That wasn't your fault," Bruce said.

Bucky gave him a thin, sad smile. "So everyone keeps telling me." He thumbed on his tablet, effectively ending the conversation.

Things were fine for five minutes. And then Steve came in.

Bucky's head shot up again, and for an instant his expression was a complicated morass of happiness, sorrow and fear, each sliding over his features before his face settled into a neutral expression that Natasha doubted fooled anyone. He looked down at his tablet before Steve could even smile at him.

Steve saw Bucky and froze. He had difficulty hiding his emotions at the best of times, and now his hope was painfully clear. "Hi, Bucky," he said, trying so hard to sound casual that Natasha might've laughed if anything about this were funny.

"Hi," Bucky said softly. He lifted his head again like he couldn't help it, even managed a smile before he looked away.

The longing between the two of them stretched out like a wire, pulling at everyone's nerves. Natasha wondered if she was actually going to have to ask them both to leave, when Steve finally moved.

He took a deep breath, then squared his shoulders as if he was walking into a fight. He crossed the room, set his sketchbook down on the coffee table, then went right to Bucky's chair. He sat cross-legged on the floor with his back to the chair, then leaned his head on Bucky's thigh.

Bucky all but shot out of his chair. "Please don't do that," he said. His voice rattled like gravel in a jar.

Steve looked up at him, and the shred of hope still clinging to his smile broke Natasha's heart.

"Make me," Steve said.

Natasha heard Tony's murmured, 'whoa' and Jane's gasp. Her reaction was more schooled but the surprise was just as genuine. It wasn't just the defiance, though that was unusual enough. It was that it was _Steve_. He was headstrong, of couse. Stubborn, certainly. But outright defiance of his Dom? In public? Not him. Not in a million years. And yet, there it was.

She looked at Bucky, expecting…she didn't actually know, she realized. Anger, perhaps. Irritation.

Instead, Bucky went white. He backed up a step, his eyes huge and afraid. "I'm sorry. I can't…." He swallowed instead of finishing the sentence, then turned and walked out of the room. The _thud_ of the stairwell door closing was extremely loud in the ensuing silence.

"Steve," Jane said, "would you come here, please?" She turned to her sub. "Thor, would you be so kind as to get Steve a cushion?"

"Of course, My Lady." He obeyed her immediately.

Steve pulled himself heavily to his feet. "Thank you. But you don't have to—"

"I said, come here," Jane interrupted. Her voice had only the barest edge to it, but Steve's cheeks pinked. 

"Yes, ma'am."

"Look at me when I speak to you."

Steve obediently did. "Yes, ma'am. Sorry." He went to her and sat on the cushion Thor provided with his legs crossed, the same way he had for Bucky. Thor knelt again on Jane's other side and leaned his head against her leg. She tugged Steve's hair until he did the same, then picked up her journal and started to read, carding her fingers through Steve's hair.

She looked like a tiny queen, with a beautiful sub on either side of her like big, golden lions. Thor relaxed completely against his lady, hugging her calf. Steve had his eyes shut and his face turned into her leg, but it was painfully obvious he wasn't getting what he needed. When Jane softly dismissed him a few minutes later, Natasha wasn't surprised.

"There's plenty of room on the couch," she said to him. It wasn't a command or even an invitation, leaving him the choice.

"No, thank you." Steve picked his sketchbook and pencils off the table, then sat down in the chair Bucky had vacated. He put the sketchbook on his lap and even opened it, but Natasha was sure he wouldn't draw anything.

She was right.

* * *

Steve kicked off his shoes next to the door, dropped his sketchbook and pencil on the coffee table and walked straight into the bathroom, stripping off his tee-shirt and leaving it in a pile next to the door.

Then he leaned against the sink, staring at himself in the ridiculously large mirror but seeing nothing. He felt like he had before the serum: with his heart pounding so hard it seemed like it would literally break and kill him.

Part of him wanted it, too. Just…let all of this be over. He really didn't want to die, but he didn't want to go on like this. This endless fucking limbo of wanting that was never going to end.

It'd be easier if he just gave up, but he was too stubborn, that was his problem. Too stupid to run away from a fight, even the ones he'd already lost going in. He should run away from this one, stop reading anything into the constant sadness in Bucky's eyes, or the way he'd watch Steve when he thought Steve didn't notice. He needed to stop pretending that he caused any of Bucky's few genuine smiles, that he made Bucky feel anything other than misery or guilt. He _really_ needed to stop thinking that Bucky stayed on this floor with him out of anything other than misguided kindness. It wasn't like they shared meals or talked or spent any time together outside of missions.

Maybe if Bucky had a place of his own he'd be more comfortable? Maybe he and Steve could at least be friends, if Bucky had more space. Bucky hadn't wanted that before. He and Steve had shared beds since they were children, an apartment before the war, and tents and sleeping bags during. Bucky used to sleep with Steve wrapped in his arms, his breath warm and familiar on the back of Steve's neck; protecting him against anything that might come in the dark. They slept like that even after Steve was too big to make it practical. Bucky never seemed to mind.

But that was a long time ago. Steve didn't know Bucky anymore. They slept in separate rooms now, when Bucky slept at all.

Steve kept waiting for Bucky to move out. He was almost looking forward to the sick relief as much as he dreaded it. At least it'd be over. Maybe it'd finally ease the tension that constantly made Steve want to crawl out of his own skin.

He wanted to be settled. He wanted to be held down and kept still and forced to listen. He wanted to slip into that quiet place inside his skull where he was calm and safe and didn't have to think for a little while. But he couldn't. He hadn't had that since the train, and now Bucky wouldn't even touch him.

"Make me," Steve murmured to the deadness of his expression. He looked so tired. How could he look that tired when his heart was slamming against his ribs? He put his hand over his bare chest, feeling the echo of the too rapid beat quivering under his palm. It wasn't late, but he was still exhausted. All he wanted to do was sleep, but he couldn't stand the idea of laying in his too big, too soft bed by himself again. And he knew he was far too agitated to sleep anyway.

Steve had gotten Bucky's spare field knife when he'd asked to have most of Bucky's things back from the Smithsonian. He'd bought a cheap nylon sheath for it and taped it to the back of the toilet tank. It was a laughably transparent hiding spot, provided anyone was searching for a knife hidden in a bathroom. Steve was certain Bucky could find it in seconds, if it'd even occurred to him to look. But of course it hadn't occurred to him to look. They hadn't talked enough for Bucky to get suspicious about anything.

Steve finished undressing then slid the knife out of the sheath and went into the shower. Then he leaned against the wall and cut neat horizontal rows across his stomach, along his thighs and his upper arms, pressing only hard enough to make it hurt. Bucky had never hurt him like this. The one time he'd made Steve bleed he'd been so disgusted at Steve's reaction he'd never offered that again, and Steve had been too ashamed to ask. He hadn't needed it again anyway, not when Bucky could hold him down.

No one had held Steve down for a long time, and there was no one he wanted to ask. The only real Dominants he knew were Natasha, Jane and Maria Hill. He respected Maria but he barely knew her, and asking Jane to hold him still would be like asking a mouse to pin an elephant. He hadn't trusted Natasha enough to even think of asking her, before they'd taken down S.H.I.E.L.D. together. He trusted her enough now, but she was almost as small as Jane. He'd have to obey her without a fight, for her to settle him. 

All the same, he thought about asking Natasha sometimes, bringing her Bucky's knife. But every time he did he could only see Bucky's face afterwards, when he'd realized what Steve had made him do. The shame of wanting that again lodged hot and thick in Steve's chest and made it hard to even meet her eyes.

But lately, the blood and the pain were the only things that helped. He'd been using the knife more and more often.

Steve kept cutting until his arms and chest were streaming, then he tossed the knife into the sink and sat on the shower floor, watching the blood run. He leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes, concentrating on nothing but the itchy, liquid warmth and the pain. Finally, finally, some of the tension eased.

It wasn't enough. Nothing would be, without Bucky. But it was better. He could last a while longer now. He could go out and pretend everything was all right.

He stood up and turned the water on as hot as he could stand to milk the pain of the heat on his still open cuts. He waited until the first ones he'd made started to close before he used the soap.

Steve made sure to stay in the shower until all the cuts stopped bleeding. Bucky hated seeing Steve hurt. If he knew Steve had just cut himself he'd be horrified. Steve didn't want to see that expression on Bucky's face ever again.

He just wished he didn't care.

* * *

Natasha sighed at Clint's knotted forearms. With his large muscles locked like that, no wrap she tied on him would stay. Feeling secured while still knowing he was safe was usually one of the best ways to get his mind off of something. He definitely needed that now, but he wouldn't relax enough to let her tie him down. 

"Tell me, _solnishka_ , what's wrong?"

"I hate it. I fucking hate it," Clint said on a blast of air. "Um. Not what you're doing, _gospoža_ ," he added sheepishly a moment later.

Natasha just arched an eyebrow. She deliberately pulled on the cord attached to the knotwork she'd managed to wrap around his wrist, until he sucked in a small breath. It was a good breath, though. Nice and calming. Perfect.

She quickly finished the wrap now that he wasn't holding the tension in his arms. She couldn't help smiling back at him when he grinned at her. He always cut so easily through her defenses. That was one of the many reasons she loved him. "Unless you safeword, I'm going to assume you're not talking about what I'm doing." She deftly knotted the cord through the ring sunk securely in the wall above their bed. "How's that? Tight enough or too tight?"

Clint tugged experimentally, then grinned at her when his arm barely budged. "You know I fell in love with you for your rope tying skills."

She smirked as she shook her head. "Answer the question."

"It's perfect. Just like you."

"Sap." Natasha laughed and smacked him lightly on the chest, then walked around the bed, checking that his ankles were tied good and tight but that his circulation was fine. His toes were warm and they all twitched when she tickled the balls of his feet. Satisfied, Natasha began tying Clint's right arm. "What do you hate, then?"

"The way Steve and Bucky are…." Clint huffed a frustrated breath. "I don't even know what the hell they are. Other than miserable. You've seen it, right? It's like, pathetic. Pathetically pathetic with a side of really sad."

Natasha carded her fingers through his hair a few times before she finished with his wrist. "It is pathetic and sad. Mostly sad. But you know it's not your responsibility. How are your arms now?"

Clint yanked. "Fine."

He wasn't smiling anymore. Natasha tugged on his hair to make sure he was paying attention. "You _will_ safeword the moment you're too uncomfortable to continue," she reminded him, because when he was upset he sometimes forgot he was allowed to stop the scene if he didn't like it. Natasha knew she was overly cautious about that, but Clint had been taught that a sub should endure pain to an extent that rivaled some of the Red Room's torture.

She was glad he'd never asked what she'd done to his former Dominants. It was no more than they'd earned for their abuse, but she was sure Clint wouldn't understand that. He had a surprisingly gentle heart, considering that in his own way he was as deadly an assassin as she. He'd never quite accepted that he hadn't deserved what they'd done.

At least she could make absolutely certain he never let anyone hurt him that badly again.

She sat on the edge of the bed and kept carding her fingers through his hair. "Are you comfortable enough?" He was wearing sweatpants but his chest was bare. He nodded, then shivered a little when she drew her nails down his sternum. His skin didn't feel overly cool. 

"I know Bucky and Steve aren't my responsibility," he said. "But, they're hurting so bad, Nat. And I just keep thinking…." He trailed off, then stayed silent until Natasha wondered if she'd have to order him to tell her. Clint bit his lip, but finally seemed to find the words to continue. "I keep thinking about how it was after...after Loki."

Natasha smoothed her palm up and down his chest. "You didn't want me to touch you."

He nodded. "I didn't deserve it. Not after everything I'd done."

"I know that's what you felt." She didn't bother to tell him that what Loki did to him wasn't his fault. He was as aware of that as he'd ever be, and had accepted it as much as he could. "I'm so glad you came back to us."

"Me too. But Bucky's like I was. Only I think it's worse, because it was so much longer for him. But Steve's not like you. He's not fighting for him the way you fought for me."

"The dynamics are reversed. Steve is used to fighting wars, not his Dom." She drew patterns on Clint's chest with her nails, enjoying the play of his muscles as they rippled under her hand. "If I was the one who kept refusing you, would you fight me?"

Clint blinked up at her, his eyes big and guileless and sincere. He swallowed. "I'd face Loki again for you."

"I know." She was certain of it. "But, would you fight _me?_ Would you refuse to give me what I said I wanted?"

"Steve just did that on the common floor."

"No, he didn't." Natasha drew a heart over his ribs. "That defiance had the air of a ritual. It wasn't real." She flattened her hand and rubbed gentle circles where her nails had been. "Would you refuse to give me what I said I wanted?" She asked again, gently.

Clint opened his mouth, closed it again. He looked stricken, but he shook his head. "No," he said softly. "No, I couldn't. You're my Domme."

"Exactly. Steve's doing what his Dom says he wants."

"But it's killing him. It's killing both of them."

"I know, _zvezda moya_. But what do you think you can do?"

Clint licked his lips. "I was thinking I could maybe...be Bucky's...sub? I mean, just take care of him," he added quickly, as if she'd somehow think he'd intended to cheat on her. "Not like what I do for you."

She blinked. "You want to sub for him?"

"No! Well, yes. Kind of." Clint tensed, pulling on the ropes securing him. Natasha could see how it relaxed him enough to continue. "He's got no one, and he's falling apart. And it's killing Steve. And that's affecting the rest of the team. And Bruce and Tony have their own issues. And Thor, well, I think Thor trying to help Bucky would be a disaster."

Natasha grimaced, thinking of the sweet-natured, boisterous sub trying to coax the reclusive, anxious Dom out of his shell. "What do you think your subbing for him would achieve?"

"He's like some stray cat. I figure, if I lure him out, get him trust me, he might get used to, I dunno, being a Dom again. And once that happens, maybe he can start to be Steve's Dom again."

"That's not the worst idea you've ever had." She smiled and traced his cheek with her fingertips to take any derision out of her words. "It might even work. How do you think Steve will react?"

Clint blushed and pulled on his bonds again, but his eyes stayed steadily on hers. "I was thinking, um, that Steve needs someone to take care of him, too."

"Clint, that's too many people for you…." Natasha stopped speaking as she realized what he meant. "You're asking me to take care of Steve."

Clint nodded, though now he didn't look quite as certain. "Not like you take care of me, or anything, but…the only other Domme who might be able to, really, is Jane. She's busy with Thor, though. And she's strict, but not as badass as you are. And I think that's what Steve needs."

 _Make me,_ Natasha thought. "You mean, I can deal with his defiance."

"Yeah. And Jane could probably deal with that too, but she's all about the tone and the attitude. You could actually whip him or whatever. Like you do with Bruce sometimes."

"Bruce is obedient. I'm not interested in sub who doesn't follow commands." Dealing with a sub apparently used to being forced into submission wasn't a responsibility she wanted. "If Steve defies me, I'll walk away."

"Well, he probably won't, 'cause you're not Bucky," Clint said. "I mean, if he even accepts your help at all."

Natasha hummed in agreement. She didn't insult Clint by pointing out that if his idea even worked, it would be neither fast nor easy. Of everyone in the Avengers, the two of them were the most intimately acquainted with how difficult it could be to find your way home. But she couldn't deny that that same experience made them uniquely qualified to help. 

She looked down at Clint, so eager and trusting under her hand, and thought of how much he'd helped her in those first dark months after she'd come to S.H.I.E.L.D., but before she'd learned to trust. 

Clint was wonderfully gentle and pliant when he wanted to be. And he had a backbone of steel when he didn't. She wasn't certain that he knew exactly how monumental this task was, but if there was a sub that could do it, it would be her own. 

"All right, _zvezda moya_ ," she said. "We'll try it."

His grin was bright and sweet, and as lovely as the rest of him.

"But now, you've spent entirely too much time worrying about other people." Natasha picked up the spiked wheel from the nightstand. "I'll be gone for the next few days, so for the rest of tonight, I want you focused on me alone." He arched up into the light touch of the wheel tracing paths across his chest and belly. 

It wouldn't take her long to drive all other thoughts out of both of their minds.

* * *

They agreed that she would talk to Steve first, if only because Clint was sure dealing with Bucky would need an actual battle plan. Natasha was distantly amused at the idea of planning an intervention for a friend requiring the same type of preparation as planning for a siege. Mostly, though, she was sad they both knew it'd take exactly that level of effort.

Steve looked exhausted when he opened the door to his suite. It was tragic how hard he had to work to summon a smile. 

"Is Bucky here?" she asked.

He shook his head. "I think he's in the gym again."

"Good. May I come in?"

He blinked, then tried to suppress a sigh. "I'm not really feeling up to visitors tonight, Nat."

She arched her eyebrows, putting on a suggestion of hurt that she didn't actually feel. "Is that what I am? A visitor?" 

He winced. "No, of course not. I'm sorry." He stood back and gestured for her to enter. Beyond him, she could see half a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter on the bar separating the living room from the kitchen. Next to the jar was a single plate with a knife laying across it, and a single green apple. Miserable dinner for one.

She hugged him, because it was all so sad. She kept her arms tight around him until he got over his surprise and did the same.

"Thank you," he said, and the shock in his voice made her hold on that much longer. "What was that for?"

She didn't want to tell him about the textbook example of loneliness spread across his counter, so instead she just smiled at him. "You looked like you could use one." It was the truth anyway. "You're not alone, Steven."

He blinked. "I know that."

His dinner said otherwise, but she went to his couch instead of arguing. She sat on the couch arm while he took the cushions, which kept her head approximately level with his. 

"Steve," she began seriously, "you know I'm your friend, right?"

He nodded, though he looked a little confused. "Yes. Is this about the Triskelion?"

"More about the aftermath." She smiled, appreciating his quick mind. They'd worked together beautifully, but hadn't truly been friends until running that gantlet together. "I hope you take what I'm about to say as observations from a friend."

She could see him tense, but he nodded again.

"You're stressed, and deeply unhappy. I know it's because of James, and I also know it's not your fault. But your inability to deal with it is affecting the team."

He looked angry and hurt. "If you've been having issues with my leadership, you should've said something."

"This has nothing to do with your leadership." She rubbed the back of his neck the way she would for Clint. Steve didn't expose his nape to her, but at least he didn't pull away. "You have remarkable restraint. But we can all tell something's not right, and it's making everyone anxious. And as a friend, _only_ as a friend," she emphasized, "if there's something I can do to help, I hope you'll ask me."

She met his eyes, waiting patiently as he thought about her offer. "Thank you," he said quietly, but then moved away from her hand. It was subtle and polite, but the meaning was clear. "I would, but there's nothing you can do."

As usual, he wasn't going to surrender without a fight. She didn't know if that was because of his pride, his loyalty to Bucky, or because he truly thought his situation was hopeless. 

_Make me_. Then again, maybe it was just so deeply ingrained in his nature he didn't know how to acquiesce without the battle first.

She gave up on any subtlety and went straight to the point. "Steve, when was the last time you submitted at all, much less went fully down?"

He drew in a breath, eyes wide and shocked, but then crossed his arms. "That's not your concern." He sounded angry, but he couldn't meet her eyes.

"It is," she said simply. "It is my concern, both as your teammate and your friend."

"I can do my job!"

"I know." She slid onto the couch cushions, putting her head below his so he'd have to look down to properly talk to her. It was forcing him to echo the body language of a sub, kneeling with the nape exposed. She knew he knew what she was doing and didn't appreciate it, but Natasha had never been above using manipulation to gain the results she needed. "I am absolutely certain you can do your job. You have been doing your job. But you're not happy, and the situation is only getting worse. And everyone has a breaking point."

"I'm not going to break."

She didn't dignify that with a response. Instead she lifted her right arm, rolling her hand. "Remember what you told me last year, when I sprained my wrist?"

"That I didn't want someone in the field who wasn't at the top of their game." He glared at her. "This isn't the same thing."

She just stared at him until he sighed and scrubbed his hand over his face. "I'm trying to fix this, Nat. Really. I just need more time."

"This isn't about you fixing things with Bucky," she said seriously. "This is about me, as your friend, wanting you to have an outlet. I'm not saying it has to be me, but I'm offering. Please think about it."

He crossed his arms again and jutted his chin. "What if I want you to hurt me?"

She blinked, the only betrayal of her shock. "I didn't know you wanted that." 

Steve blushed, but he kept his pose, as if challenging her to refuse him. "Not often, but, yeah. Sometimes. I'll understand if you're not interested in that."

He was expecting her to say no, she could tell. He was probably even counting on it. Instead she put her hand over his. "I won't risk your safety, Steve. But I am interested in helping my friend."

For a moment he looked like he had no idea what to do with her agreement, then he swallowed and looked away, as if the possibility of someone helping him was more than he could deal with. "Thank you," he said, voice rough. "I appreciate the offer. And I'll think about it."

She couldn't tell if he was blowing her off or not, but she knew to take what small victories she could. So, "That's all I'm asking, Steve," she said, then smiled and got to her feet. He was a gentleman, so he stood as well. "Oh, Clint wanted me to tell you that he's got half a season of that American Ninja Warrior competition queued up and a mixed twelve pack of craft beers."

Steve's answering smile told her he was very aware that Clint's message was no coincidence before he shook his head. "Tell him thanks, but not tonight. I, uh, I think I'd like to be alone."

Which would be the worst thing for him, of course. Natasha glanced at what would have been his dinner and brought in the big guns. "And a pot of goulash." 

Steve smirked. She pretended not to notice how sad he sounded. "Your sub drives a hard bargain."

"You have no idea." She put her hand on his arm, less-than-subtly steering him with her out of his suite. "Come save me from a night of snobby microbrews and testosterone."

Steve smirked again, and maybe it was a little more genuine this time. "Anything for a friend."

* * *

Clint was careful to make sure nothing he did would alert his target. He knew how finely tuned his target's senses were, but he was good at this shit. Bucky wasn't going to know what hit him until Clint damn well wanted him to. 

He grinned as he triumphantly slid the second perfectly made BLT onto a plate and then carried both sandwiches out from the common floor's kitchen and into the living room. He slid one of the plates onto the table next to where Bucky was sitting, then sat down on the couch with his own plate and sandwich. 

"I'm not hungry. You don't need to feed me," Bucky said immediately. His gaze never left his tablet screen, but he scooched that much further into the corner of his preferred armchair, as if he was trying to hide.

Just like an alley cat, Clint thought, not sure if the next open hand was going to feed you or slap you stupid. Well, Clint had fed his share of stray cats, and skulked in their alleys more than once. He knew how to handle this. 

"S'cool," he said, turning away from Bucky and taking a bite of his own sandwich. The aroma of the bacon had been making him hungry the entire time he'd been cooking, and it was well after lunchtime as it was. He risked a quick glance at Bucky.

Bucky was still trying to read his history of the Vietnam War book (as if there wasn't enough pain in Bucky's life, seriously), but he kept lifting his head to look at the sandwich. 

Clint took another bite. The toast and lettuce were crisp, like the bacon. Visual stimulation: check. Olfactory: check. Auditory: check. This was a good—no, make that delicious—opening gambit. Clint was pretty pleased with himself, he had to admit. But he knew better than to get his hopes too far up. Especially with Bucky. 

Bucky looked at Clint, looked at the sandwich again, looked back at Clint and then finally gave a huff like he was feeling intensely put upon. But he grabbed the plate, pulled it onto his lap and took a bite.

Clint made sure to keep his gaze on the comic book he was thumbing through while munching away at his own sandwich. He didn't grin. He definitely didn't grin.

"Thanks, but you don't need to do this," Bucky said after he'd practically inhaled everything except the actual plate. He didn't even sound grudging. Score. "I know how to make a sandwich." 

_Apparently not,_ Clint thought. "I don't mind. I was making one for myself anyway." He held up his sandwich as evidence. He didn't mention how painfully obvious it was that Bucky "I know how to make a sandwich" Barnes wasn't feeding himself. Nat had already told Clint about Steve's pathetically lonely peanut butter sandwiches; it didn't take a genius to know the two men weren't eating together. And if they weren't eating together, it was a sure bet that the formerly brainwashed, former weapon was barely eating at all.

Clint had to introduce Natasha to feeding herself too, when he'd brought her in. And she'd at least always known she was human.

"Well, you didn't have to." Bucky put his plate on the coffee table, eyed Clint, then got up and took the plate to the kitchen. He came back with two sodas and held one out. "Here." It was polite, but the meaning behind it was clear. _You aren't my sub. I don't want you to serve me._

Well, fuck. But Clint knew how to play that game. "Thanks!" He smiled and took a soda like he hadn't noticed Bucky's less-than-subtle rebuff. He used the edge of the table to pop off the cap.

If Bucky had hoped for less enthusiasm, he didn't let on either. "You're welcome." He went back to reading. "The sandwich was good," he added.

"Glad you liked it." Clint turned back to his comic, smiling to himself. Bucky hadn't fled, he'd eaten the food, and they'd had something approaching a conversation. It was a small victory, maybe, but Clint congratulated himself on a victory all the same.

* * *

It was late when Bucky returned to the ridiculously large suite he shared with Steve. 

It didn't feel right, thinking of the suite as something he and Steve 'shared'. It was Steve's. Bucky was an interloper; a piece of Steve's past that had no place here. No matter how much Bucky might want it.

Steve wouldn't agree, but Steve was one of those people who kept trying to live in the world they wanted, rather than the one that was. It took strength to live like that. The kind of strength too many people took for weakness.

Bucky had always known how strong Steve was. But sometimes you had to accept things as they were, and Steve never did. It was why he got the shit beat out of him so often before the war, and it was why he would've let Bucky kill him.

It was why Steve was still living as if he was going to get his Dom back. Like it was just a matter of time.

Bucky lived in the world as it was, and that was the reason he skulked into the apartment long after he knew Steve would've gone to bed. Cowardly, sure, but also so much easier than having to face him and ignore how desperately Steve wanted things Bucky couldn't give him anymore.

It was even harder to ignore how much he still wanted Steve. So Bucky avoided him. It was safer that way. He just wished it were easier, instead of him always feeling like half his heart was gone. He never thought he could miss someone so much while living with them.

Steve had left a note on the counter: _It was late so I went to bed, but I put a plate for you in the icebox, if you want dinner._

_I love you._

Bucky didn't realize he'd crushed the paper in his hand until he felt the corners digging into his skin. He'd eaten the sandwich Clint made him hours ago, but that didn't change how his stomach turned to lead. Nausea grabbed him by the throat and shook him until Bucky was gagging over the sink, dizzy and sweating.

 _Idiot. Idiot. Idiot._ It was just a note, for fuck's sake. He hadn't even opened the fridge. What the hell was wrong with him?

Bucky turned the tap on full. He cupped the cold water in his metal hand and wet his face until he felt less shaky, then turned the water off and bent over the counter with his head on his folded arms. Even with his eyes closed the room did a slow turn around him.

He knew what was wrong with him.

It was so stupid. He was so fucking stupid, letting something this trivial mess him up like this. _It's just a meal,_ he told himself ferociously. _It's just food. Clint made you food too. It doesn't mean anything._

The damn sandwich had been fine, even though Clint had obviously made two purposely to be able to give Bucky one, no matter what he said. But if he needed Bucky to eat, so what? Food was fuel. Hell, his handlers had made sure Vanya and the Asset ate—don't want your superweapon starving to death, after all—and yeah, some of them were subs, but that didn't matter. It wasn't special.

The sandwich Clint had made Bucky was nice. It was a nice gesture, even if he was sure there was a gambit behind it. But it wasn't special. It wasn't a _gift._

Steve, leaving food for him? That was a gift.

There was no other way Bucky could think about it, nothing he could tell himself that would stick in his head. Steve wasn't his sub anymore, but it was like his heart couldn't remember that. So here he was, gagging over a sink because as far as his completely FUBAR psyche was concerned, his sub Steve had left a gift of food for him. 

_Like Alina, taking his hand to pull him outside at the end of a storm, just to show him a rainbow. Or Timur, grinning shyly as he tucked a flower behind Vanya's ear._

_Or Grisha. Sweet, gentle, beloved Grisha, telling Vanya stories of his life before the Red Room took him; sharing his own history with a man who had none. And making promises of a little house, a little garden for the two of them, somewhere safe and warm and peaceful. A dream of a future they both knew they'd never have._

Bucky gritted his teeth around the awful noise he wanted to make and wrenched his mind back to the present. He blinked sweat and tears out of his eyes, hating himself for the remorse he didn't deserve. He carefully smoothed the note out again, then folded it neatly and put it in his pocket.

He left the food in the fridge. 

He needed a shower, get rid of the sweat. Maybe the water and the rote comfort would relax him enough that he could sleep.

Bucky went into their bathroom, shucked his clothes and tossed them into the corner, but only after he took the note from his pocket and put it where it wouldn't get wet.

The room was huge, opulently so. Time was Bucky would've loved to set Steve up in a swank apartment like this, treat him the way he'd always wanted to, give him everything. Now it was just another thing Bucky had no right to.

He realized when he stepped under the spray that he'd only turned the cold water on. His hand hovered over the hot water tap, but in the end he didn't touch it.

_Warmth is a reward, little soldier. What have you done to earn it?_

Bucky slid down to the floor of the shower, then pulled up his knees and let the ice water pound down on him. His shivering had nothing to do with the temperature.

 _Stop it. Control yourself. Stand up. Get a grip for fuck's sake. It was just a meal._ The voice in his head was snarling at him in Russian.

He should listen to it. He didn't want to be cold. He didn't want to be alone. He wanted Steve. He wanted—

_You don't deserve him._

_You hurt him. They all suffered, because of you._

_You do not dominate anyone, little soldier. You do as you're told._

"Leave me alone!" Bucky slapped his hands over his head, as if that could keep out the voices that were already inside his skull. He smacked the back of his head against the shower wall: once; twice; three times; four. It hurt, but it didn't stop anything.

"Bucky?"

Bucky gasped and snapped his eyes open. Steve was standing far enough inside the stall that half his body was getting soaked, the left leg of his pajama pants clinging. "Bucky, what's wrong? I heard you yelling…Are you okay?"

"Stevie?"

Steve nodded. He came right into the shower though he hugged himself against the water's chill. "I'm right here, Buck. What is it? What's wrong? Why is the water so cold?"

Bucky almost reached for him, then jerked his hands back so fast his left elbow shattered a tile. "Go away. Please," he rasped. He wanted Steve so badly, but he couldn't have him. He could only cause pain. "Please, get away from me," he said more loudly, because Steve wasn't listening. (He never listened. That was their game. Stevie never listened until Bucky made him. But there were no games anymore. Nothing but his bullets lodged in Steve's body. Nothing but his metal fist hitting that beautiful face over and over again….)

Steve took a step closer. "I'm not gonna hurt you. Let me help." He reached for Bucky. 

Bucky jerked back, pulling himself in as tightly as he could. "Don't touch me! I'll hurt you. Get away! Please, go away!" He kicked out, sending a sluice of freezing water over Steve's feet.

Steve's eyes were huge. "I know you won't hurt me. Bucky, please…!"

Bucky shook his head frantically. "Steve," he said, trying for something approaching calm, something like the voice he used as Steve's Dom, when he meant it. "You have to leave."

He could see the denial in Steve's eyes even before his lips shaped a word. But in the end he didn't say them. Instead he just nodded and left Bucky alone, like a good sub would. 

Bucky put his face in his hands and shook from cold and relief and loneliness and grief and fear. _Help me,_ he thought. _Stevie, help me. I'm coming apart._

But Steve wouldn't come back unless Bucky called for him. And Bucky didn't.

* * *

Operation Care and Feeding had been a success. A modest success, but enough of one that Clint figured he could up his game. Early the next morning (stupid early, fucking super soldier insomniacs) he left a very large plate of cookies on the coffee table.

Clint sat in one of the huge armchairs under a window with his feet pulled up in the seat, reading and eating a cookie. He waited.

Bucky came in with his Starktab, looking as rough as if the day was already over and it'd been a really bad one. He saw the cookies and stopped dead. Then he laughed.

It wasn't a good laugh. It wasn't a, 'hey, cookies! Awesome!' kind of laugh. It was more like the laced-with-hysteria kind of laugh that people gave when the only other option was screaming.

Bucky scraped his fingers through his hair, then wrenched his gaze away from the platter of cookies to find Clint. "Why are there cookies?"

Clint blinked. This was really not what he'd expected. "I...don't even understand that question," he said with complete honesty. "Why should there _not_ be cookies? Cookies are the best food ever. Cookies _rock_."

Bucky went back to staring at the cookies without moving any further into the room. He scrubbed his face, and when he lowered his hand he looked even worse than when he'd come in, like a plate of cookies had somehow pushed him over the edge. Clint almost offered him a hug along with a cookie.

"I don't get this, Clint," he said on a sigh so deep it probably took his soul out with it. "What do you need? Why do you keep tryin' to feed me?"

Clint frowned, going for the only possible response—denial. "I'm not! It's not like I put your name on them or anything. I put them out in the common room for everyone."

"Right." Bucky crossed his arms, but his glare was too tired to mean much. "You put out cookies at 5:30 am. When Nat's not here." He pinched the bridge of his nose. "What do you need, Clint? Just tell me."

It was weird, how Bucky kept saying that— _what do you need?_ —like it was a code phrase someone had beat into him. But it was precisely because someone probably _had_ beaten it into him that Clint made sure not to mention it. "I don't need anything. I couldn't sleep. So I made cookies." It wasn't really a lie. He just maybe would've slept better if he hadn't set his alarm for three in the morning. He rubbed the back of his neck, looking up at Bucky through his eyelashes. It was a calculated move that had gotten more than one Dom to trust him when they shouldn't. Clint wasn't trying to pull anything on Bucky, but he wasn't above manipulating him a little to make a rapport. He bit his lip and widened his eyes. Maybe a lot to make a rapport. "It's just...Nat's not here. And—"

Bucky winced and shook his head. "No. Forget it. It's none of my business. You don't have to tell me." His mouth twitched into a sad little smile. "We all got our reasons for not sleeping, huh?"

"Guess so. Um, you don't have to have a cookie," Clint said, because Bucky was still staring at the cookies like they were going to explode.

"Look," Bucky said on a breath, "did you make these for me or not?"

"No!" Clint didn't even say it too fast. "There're, like, four dozen. I made chocolate chip, molasses and raisin, sugar cookies and oatmeal. Are you going to eat four dozen cookies?"

Bucky swallowed like just the idea of it made him want to puke.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah. I'm fine." Bucky did not look fine. He looked like he was trying not to hurl. "You really didn't make these for me?"

"I really didn't make them for you," Clint said. "Seriously, are you all right?"

"I'm fine," Bucky repeated distantly. He glanced at Clint, then back at the cookies, then grabbed one, took a bite and chewed and swallowed so fast Clint doubted he'd even tasted it.

"What's wrong?" Clint asked, confused and worried. "I said, you didn't have to—"

"It's good," Bucky said, as dead-voiced as if he was talking about a weapon. He looked at the half-cookie left in his hand, then looked at Clint, and then finished it. Clint had seen S.H.I.E.L.D. agents on survival courses eating insect larvae with more enjoyment.

"Jesus Christ, Barnes, it's a cookie, not a fucking endurance test." Clint went to take another bite of his own, then dropped it back on the plate, Bucky's obvious disgust making the thought of finishing his own unappetizing. "Why the hell did you even take one of you didn't want it?"

Bucky swallowed a few times, like he was trying to work up enough saliva to get the cookie down his throat. "You, uh, you really wanted me to."

"I didn't want you to fucking _choke yourself!_ " Clint stood up, bewildered and more than a little angry. "I just wanted you to try one, that's all. I _said_ you didn't have to, like, fourteen times! What the hell's your problem?"

"Oh," Bucky said softly. "I, uh…I thought you didn't mean it." He swallowed again. "I'm sorry." He turned and went to the stairwell. 'Fled' was the more accurate term. Chased away by cookies.

Clint was miserably certain he'd gone to find a place to throw up. And seriously, what the hell.

"That went wonderfully." He lifted the rest of his cookie, but just put it back on the plate again. He was feeling kind of nauseous now too. The kind that came from knowing you fucked up, but having no idea when, how, or why.

* * *

Bucky went back to Steve's suite, tossed the Starktab on the couch and then went directly to the bathroom to throw up. Steve was out on his morning run, which Bucky was grateful for. Steve would think he was sick, which wasn't supposed to be possible for them these days. He'd worry and try to drag Bucky to the infirmary. Bucky would have to explain why the hell he was puking at O'dark in the morning.

The idea of having to do _that_ was so awful it sent Bucky back to his knees, guts roiling. By the time he felt human again all that was left in him was spit and bile.

 _Felt human._ No, he really didn't. That was the problem. That was always the problem.

As soon as Bucky could get off the floor, he rinsed his mouth with cold water until his teeth ached, then went to change into something he could run in.

He tied his shoes with fingers clumsy with adrenaline. There was cold sweat dotting his skin, but his face burned with shame. Maybe he should just avoid the common room from now on, in case Clint tried to give him something again. But that meant he'd be stuck _here_ , and that would be even worse.

And the common floor was one of the few places in the tower he didn't feel too badly out of place in, as long as there weren't too many other people there. If he let Clint chase him out of there he'd have nowhere to go.

Well, there were other rooms in the tower. Maybe he should just do that: lock himself away like a hermit. At least that way he'd know for sure he wouldn't hurt anyone.

 _You're already hurting Steve,_ his brain reminded him in the same harsh Russian that supplied most of his thoughts. Steve didn't understand why Bucky kept rejecting him, and Bucky couldn't make himself explain. Steve didn't deserve that kind of darkness. And what Bucky had done was so terrible that the idea of giving it words felt like dying. His past was a pit full of monsters. If he let any of them into the light they'd rip him apart.

He should move out. It'd be kinder than this limbo he and Steve were in, constantly orbiting each other but never colliding. False hope was just cruelty; Bucky was intimately aware of that. But every time he thought about leaving and letting Steve get on with his life, he just...stalled out. As helpless to break away from him as a comet trapped by the sun.

Sometimes he missed Steve so much it was like his heart had been torn out. And the fact that Steve was _right there_ just made it worse. Because Bucky couldn't take Steve back. He loved Steve too much to do that to him.

Thinking about Steve only added to Bucky's anxiety, so that by the time he was in the tower's enormous gym he was about ready to lose his mind. 

He went right to the treadmills Tony had specially designed for the two of them. He started out fast and kept ramping up the speed until the machine was whining and his heart was battering at his ribs and his lungs ached. And then he sped it up again.

It was a trick he'd learned by accident decades before: If he pushed hard enough, for long enough, if there was enough exhaustion and pain, he'd fall into the silent, dark place in his head where he didn't have to feel anything at all. He didn't think he'd ever remember the first time it'd happened, but he did remember all the _lessons_ —the beatings; being forced to stand still for hours; the starvation; the electric shocks; the chair—where he'd pass just the right threshold and he'd disappear. And in the emptiness there was no fear, or sorrow, or anger, or pain. The only lousy part was that he always came back.

* * *

"I'm not calling about Natasha. Natasha's fine," Clint said as soon as Laura picked up the phone.

"She just sent me one of her usual cryptic and untraceable texts about an hour ago," Laura said, and Clint could hear the smile in her voice. "But I appreciate you making sure I didn't worry."

"Thank you, mistress," Clint said, pleased. He would have liked to ask about the kids, but he didn't want to get sidetracked. He'd called his second Domme for a reason. He took a breath. "I need your advice."

"Of course," she said immediately, which was one of the many reasons he loved her. "Is this about Captain Rogers and Sergeant Barnes?"

"Yeah." He wasn't surprised that Laura had jumped to that immediately. "Didn't know it was so obvious."

"You rarely call for advice." He could hear the smile in her voice again.

"Even when I could use it, I know." Clint grinned at Laura's gentle laughter, then leaned back against the wall of the alcove he'd tucked himself into, his favorite one with the best view of the city. "My plan to get Bucky to feel comfortable around subs isn't going too well," he confessed, smile fading. "Well, when I made him lunch yesterday that was pretty good. He ate it and thanked me, though he made it clear he didn't want it to be about me serving him, you know?" He waited for Laura's hum of agreement. "But then I made cookies this morning. Enough for everyone like you said, so he wouldn't think I was courting him or anything. But he asked me if I'd made them for him about a hundred times, and I don't think he believed me when I said I didn't."

"I'm curious as to why your motivation mattered so much," Laura said. "Did he try one?"

"Yeah. Eventually. But I swear to God it was like he was choking down poison. And when I asked him why the hell he had one if he didn't want it, he said it was because 'I really wanted him to'. I told him that I really didn't, duh, and he apologized and practically ran out of the room like he was going to throw up." Clint sighed. "So, I'm kind of stuck as to what to do now."

"Oh dear. He seems to have issues with being given anything. Or at least being given food."

"Yes. Yes he does." Clint grimaced. "But, I don't know what else to do. I mean, I can't even talk to him. If he's not reading his fucking _History of Everything I can Blame Myself For, Revised and Expanded Guilt Edition_ , he's hiding in his suite or down in the gym. In fact, he's in the gym right now."

"Did you go talk to him?"

"No. J.A.R.V.I.S. told me. And God help you if you bother him while he's working out. So."

"He sounds like a stray cat."

"Exactly!" Clint agreed triumphantly. "He's exactly like a stray cat. That's why I tried the food, you know?"

"But he doesn't like being given food," Laura filled in for him.

"Yeah." Clint rubbed the back of his neck. "And even with the sandwich, he still wouldn't talk to me. There's, like, zero rapport going on. I was hoping the cookies would make him happy enough to at least start a conversation, but nope. Barf city instead. All of the stuff I did with Nat, when I first brought her in…none of it's working. I'm just…" He shrugged, though his Domme couldn't see it. "I'm at sea here. Like, in the middle of a perfect storm in a leaky boat."

Laura chuckled. "I'm sorry, sweetheart. But, you know him better than I do. Maybe…" She trailed off, and Clint could practically hear that beautiful brain of hers working. "Well, can you share things without actually _giving_ them to him? Or, if he likes working out, maybe you _should_ go to the gym when he's there. Spot him, or be his workout partner."

"If I tried to spot him I'd rip my arms off. Or he'd rip them off for me."

He didn't have to see her to know she was rolling her eyes. "Then find something else. All I'm saying is, meet him halfway. That's what you did for Nat, more than anything. You tamed her by just being nearby but quiet, until she realized she was safe with you."

Clint smiled, remembering that. Natasha had been so terrified, and so brave, giving up everything she'd ever known to trust the sub who'd been sent to kill her. "Nat was easy."

"That's not what you said at the time."

"Easier than Bucky, then."

"The ones who need it the most never make it easy." Laura didn't add, _you didn't either_ , because she loved him too much. But it was still there in the silence right afterwards.

"I was so scared I was gonna hurt you, or the kids," Clint said softly.

"I know, sweetheart. But you didn't. You came home to us, remember that. And you'll help Bucky come home too. I know you will. You've got the biggest heart of any sub I've ever met."

"You grew up in a town of, like, three other people. And a dog," Clint said, mostly because if he thought any more about what Loki did to him the world would tinge blue and he really, really didn't want to have to deal with it right then. And also because if he thought any more about how Natasha and then Laura had saved him afterwards, he'd probably start sniffling and he was calling about Bucky anyway.

"Hey, there were two dogs," Laura protested mildly, then there was more silence. Clint could imagine her worrying her lower lip. "Seriously, though, I'd see if you can talk to him while he's working out. Or, if he really can't bear conversation, at least be there. Remind him he's not alone. Sometimes that's all you need."

"Yeah," Clint said, then had to clear the roughness out of his throat. "I can do that."

"I know you can. And if you can't, call me. I'll come over there and beat some sense into him myself."

Clint smirked. "'Kinda wish you could." He took a breath. "All right. Gym> Got it. Thanks."

"My pleasure, sweetheart. But, take care, okay? Don't forget to worry about yourself, too. And, be careful. I know he's not the Winter Soldier anymore, but…" She didn't have to finish.

"I know," Clint said. "I will. I promise. You take care of yourself too, all right? I love you. And give my love to the kids."

"Always," Laura said easily. "We all love you too."

Clint was smiling as he said goodbye and hung up, but scowled as soon as he slid his phone into his pocket. Talk about bearding the lion in his goddam den. And Clint fucking hated the gym.

* * *

He had no idea how long he'd been running, but he finally felt winded. Bucky sped up the treadmill again.

And he remembered: _Grisha, who was young and big and heavy-shouldered. Blond as wheat and a submissive far too gentle for the things the Red Room made him do. But he was good enough for Vanya to train, maybe good enough to become one of the Brown Widow submissives, if he lived._

_Vanya very badly wanted Grisha to live._

_Right now they were lucky and they were alone, waiting in a cheap hotel room for the target to come. The target thought Grisha was a prostitute. Vanya would observe how effectively Grisha killed her. But she wasn't due for at least an hour, an almost unimaginable luxury of time._

_Grisha liked pain, a lot of it. Vanya didn't know what he was anymore, except that it felt right to give Grisha what he needed, even when it made Vanya's hands shake and his chest tight. But there were ways to hurt that didn't harm, and when Grisha smiled at him afterwards Vanya almost felt human._

_So here in this hotel room, with time to spare and Grisha sweet and quiet, Vanya told him about the silent, empty place he went sometimes. He was reminded of it by the stillness that came over Grisha when he hurt enough to go still. It was unsettling, that similarity, but Vanya didn't know why. Maybe Grisha would._

_Grisha listened silently, his sky-blue eyes sharpening as Vanya, uncharacteristically ineloquent, stumbled through his question. Then Grisha sat up and took Vanya's hands._

_"I think you're worried that you've become submissive," he said. "Is that why you told me this? So I could tell you if you're a submissive now?"_

_Vanya nodded uncertainly. "I don't know what I am. But I don't...I don't think I'm what you are. I think...I need to take care of you."_

_Grisha smiled, and it made him so beautiful Vanya's breath caught, because Grisha looked at_ him _like that: like he was human, like he was worth something for more than giving death and pain. And Grisha said, "You do. You're a Dominant, Vanya. Nothing that…" He bit his lip, glancing at the ceiling. The room probably wasn't bugged, but it was hard to be sure. "Nothing that's happened to you can change that." He was no longer smiling, looking at Vanya with his eyes big and somber. "This place you go...it's not the same. It's an escape, a way to hide. So you don't have to feel. For us, it's a place for us to feel_ more. _And it's_ good. _Restful. Joyful. Not just dark. Not just a place to run. Do you understand?"_

_Vanya nodded. "Yes." He understood so little, other than how to kill and who to kill and what happened when he didn't obey. But what Grisha told him felt right and real in a way that almost nothing else did. He smiled, relieved._

_Grisha beamed at him. "You're a Dom, Vanya. You're_ my _Dom. And you're so good. You take such good care of me." And he kissed him then, and that was the first time that Vanya could remember being happy._

_Less than a month after Grisha told Vanya he was a good Dom, Grisha was dead. Vanya had murdered him._

He was dead. Grisha was dead, because of him—

"Bucky, what the fuck are you doing? Stop!"

The voice was familiar but that was a command (and who the hell was Bucky?), and he knew what they wanted and no. _No_. He would _not_ hurt Grisha. They'd have to kill him first.

He leaped over the rail of the machine, using his handhold for leverage, then threw himself at the man who'd ordered him to stop. If he complied they'd make him kill Grisha, and he _wouldn't_ —

"Oh my God." The man darted behind a piece of equipment, keeping it between them. "Bucky! Bucky, it's Clint! Hawkeye! I'm your friend!"

"No," he spat in Russian. "Grisha is my friend. And I will not kill him. You hear me? I will _not._ " He used his left arm to wrench away the machine the short blond was cowering behind. He threw it away. 

"Fuck I'm gonna die." The blond backpedaled then tried to leap over the machine behind him without looking. His heel hit a piece of metal and he fell badly, but he managed to turn it into a roll and scrambled away in a desperate crabwalk until he hit the wall. "I'm your friend! It's Clint! Please, Bucky! Stop!"

The blond was speaking in Russian. That was wrong, somehow, that he'd be using that language. It wouldn't save him anyway, but…. 

He knew that voice, just like he knew the width of those shoulders and that oddly-shaped nose. Even the blond's expressions were familiar.

He stopped. "Clint?"

Clint nodded frantically. "Yeah, yeah. It's me, Bucky," he said in English. "Please don't kill me." 

"Oh, my God. I'm sorry!" Bucky backed away from Clint in horror, hyperventilating as he realized how close he'd come to nearly killing him. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he repeated, frantic. "Oh, God. I'd never…I—"

"Bucky, you're safe. You're in Avengers Tower in New York and it's 2014 and no one's going to hurt you. Bucky?" 

"No." Bucky dropped to the floor, purposely making himself unthreatening. "Don't make me kill him," he said, begging now. He'd learned long ago how to beg, how little difference it made. But he was terrified and he couldn't stop. "Please, please, not him. I can't. I can't kill him."

It didn't even matter which sub he meant anymore: Grisha or Clint or Steve or any of them. What he'd done, what had been done to them because of him, was the same.

"It's all right, Bucky. You're safe, you're safe. I'm right here, I'm sitting right over here because I can't get closer because I did something to my fucking ankle. Can you hear me? Can you understand what I'm saying?"

Bucky nodded.

"Great. That's awesome, buddy. That is absolutely great. But, you're speaking in Russian. Do you know that? Can you speak English for me? I can totally rock the Russian if you can't, that's cool. But I gotta admit, English is way easier."

"I can't remember." He hadn't known he was speaking Russian. He could understand what Clint was saying, but the words to reply were lost somewhere in his head.

"Hey, no problem. It's fine if you wanna keep speaking in Russian. It's good practice for me. Nat'll love it." Clint's voice only sounded a little strained, like he almost believed his own words. "So, you want to tell me what happened?"

Bucky shook his head. "I'm sorry," he said, though he didn't even know for what anymore. But his heart wasn't threatening to smash its way through his ribs and he was finally beginning to recognize his surroundings. He was curled up like a kicked dog on the floor of the Tower's gym, as soaking wet as if he'd been in a rainstorm. He was shaking violently, mostly with fatigue. 

He licked his dry lips. It felt like he had to go a long way down in his head to come back with the right words. "What time?" He had a Russian accent. He flinched.

"It's fine. It's all good." Of course Clint had heard it. "You speak however you need to, okay? I'll listen. I'm not going anywhere. Do you want to know what time it is? How long you've been here?"

Bucky nodded again.

Clint winced. "Six hours. You were running flat out for six hours. The treadmill was smoking, even. J.A.R.V.I.S. didn't have the place monitored 'cause he knows you're not into that. So you're just lucky I decided to show up before your Chariots of Fire experience set off the fire alarms."

The treadmill was smoking?

Bucky sat up to stare at it, only realizing when he moved how much his body hurt. He was shaking like he'd just come out of cryostasis, and now that he'd fully surfaced he was extremely aware of the deep, heavy ache from overusing his muscles. He could feel the sweat on his skin. The room was unpleasantly chilly since he'd stopped moving.

And yes, the back of the treadmill was smoking a little, and he could smell hot plastic and metal heated too long. Looked like he'd run it into the ground along with himself.

"Wow, you look like shit. Here." Clint held out a bottle of Gatorade.

Bucky couldn't stand the cloying, artificial taste, but it was blue, which was mildly intriguing. He was also unbelievably thirsty. He shuffled his way to Clint, then took the bottle, nodding in thanks. He needed both hands to keep it from spilling before he got it to his mouth.

He forced himself to drink all of it, and he did feel a little better once he had it in him. He wiped his mouth. "Thanks." He sounded like an American that time, like himself.

"Hey, Brooklyn." Clint beamed at him like Bucky had hung the fucking moon. But then he took in Bucky's face and body again and his smile disappeared. "So, what the fuck were you doing?"

"I just...wanted to run, I didn't…I wasn't trying to hurt myself."

The ironic thing was, all that running and he hadn't managed to do the one thing he'd come down here for. He'd been trying to get to the dark, quiet place in his head and instead he'd fallen down the fucking rabbit hole.

By his expression, Clint was sure Bucky had been running like this exactly to hurt himself. And maybe Clint wasn't entirely wrong. "Seriously? I mean, there's wanting to run and then there's six fucking hours, you know? What the hell happened?"

Bucky gritted his teeth. "You happened."

"What?"

Bucky ignored him, reaching up to clamp his hand around the bar of the closest treadmill. He pulled himself to his feet, and then needed to hold onto it with both hands when his knees almost gave out.

"Bucky!" Clint leapt up to help him, then collapsed right back to the floor. He put his leg out in front of him, grimacing as he clutched his ankle. "Aw, ankle. Fuck, damn it."

"What happened?" Bucky asked, but he knew: Clint fell trying to escape from him. "Oh, no. I'm sorry. I'm sorry!" He let go of the treadmill, dropping heavily to his knees. He reached for Clint's ankle but stopped with his assassin's hands hovering above the bone. 

"It's all right."

"No, it's not." Bucky used his flesh hand to carefully, carefully palpitate around the dark bruise and the rapid swelling. The way Clint hissed at even the gentlest touch made it clear the bone was broken. Bucky felt like throwing up the disgusting sport's drink, guilt clogging his throat like bile. "It's broken."

"Yeah, no fucking kidding," Clint sighed. He leaned against the wall, seemingly content to have his ankle cradled in Bucky's hand. 

Bucky put his foot down gently before he hurt Clint more than he already had. "I-I'll get help." But when he tried to stand his legs gave out entirely and he dropped back to his knees.

Clint started laughing. "This is so pathetic. It's awesome. I can't walk and you can't move. We're like, the lamest fucking Avengers ever." He blinked. "Literally." He laughed harder.

"It's not funny."

"Sure it is."

"It's not funny!" Bucky shouted. "I hurt you! I almost killed you! It's not funny! _It's not funny!_ "

"Whoa, hey." Clint lifted his hands. "You were having a flashback, dude. It's not your fault."

"Yes it is!" Bucky's metal fist hit the concrete floor hard enough to crater it. "It is my fault! You got hurt because of me! They all got hurt because of me. They _died_ because of me! Because of _me!_ That's all I do! I can't…I can't…."

His breath hitched on a sob and then he was crying like a child, shaking with his hands over his eyes. "I can't. I can't do it anymore. It doesn't stop. It won't stop. Help me. Please, help me." He didn't even know who he begging.

"Hey. Hey, Bucky. It's cool, buddy. It's all right."

Bucky flinched when Clint touched his shoulder, but it was just the steady pressure of his hand, no one was hurting him. Clint didn't speak, or move, or try to stop Bucky from crying. Bucky knew that if he wanted to leave, Clint wouldn't try to prevent it even if he could. Clint's hand on Bucky's shoulder was there to ground him, not hold him still.

He hated that he needed it. 

It took a long time before he calmed down. He couldn't remember the last time he'd cried like that. Maybe after Alina and Timur.

He shoved the memory to the far back of his mind, then cleaned his face with the hem of his sodden tee-shirt. "Sorry."

"Like I said, it's cool. Nothing wrong with crying when you need to. I've bawled all over Natasha so much I think she asked Tony to make her a snot-resistant suit." Clint squeezed Bucky's shoulder before he let go. "You okay?"

Bucky shook his head. "I hurt you. I almost killed you. You shouldn't be anywhere near me."

"You were having a flashback. Which wouldn't've happened if I hadn't yelled at you and freaked you the fuck out. So, if it's anyone's fault, it's mine." 

" _No._ " Bucky shook his head again. "It's not your fault. I'm the Dom. I should be taking care of you. Not…." He swallowed. "This is why I can't have a sub anymore. I hurt them. All I do is hurt them." He reached for the exercise machine again to pull himself to his feet. "We need to get you to the infirmary."

"Hold up for a couple minutes. My ankle's not going anywhere. Please," Clint added when Bucky ignored him. "I need to tell you this."

Bucky let himself drop back to the floor.

"Great. Thanks." Clint hesitated, grimacing. "Can't think of the right words. Damn it." He took a breath. "Okay, how about this…you don't want a sub because you think you're just going to hurt them, right?"

"I _do_ just hurt them. I broke your fucking ankle, Clint!"

"I broke my own fucking ankle, thanks," Clint snapped back easily. "But as I was saying, you think you just hurt subs. Now, I know that's bullshit, just like every other sub in the tower who's been in the same room with you for like, five minutes." He lifted his hand when Bucky opened his mouth. "Hear me out. But the point is, _you_ don't know it. So. What if you let me do what I've been trying to by making you food and keeping you company and stuff?"

Bucky recoiled from the sick lash of guilt, anger and shame. "I don't want a sub, Clint. I sure as fuck don't want to take you from your Dommes. Don't you fucking put that on me."

"Whoa!" Clint lifted both hands with his palms out, his eyes enormous before they narrowed in anger. "I'm not asking you to top me in a scene! I'm not cheating on my Dommes! No way. They know what I'm doing and gave me their permission. I'd never do something like that, and screw you for thinking I would."

"Screw you too," Bucky said without heat. He dragged the fingers of both hands through his salt-crusted hair. "What have you been trying to do, then?" He was exhausted, and from so much more than running. Or maybe it was the constant running that exhausted him. "What do you want from me?"

"Nothing. I don't want anything from you, Bucky. Swear to God. But what I was trying to do was…" Clint licked his lips, thinking. "I was trying to be, like, your practice sub. Until you got your head out—I mean, until you figured out that you weren't going to hurt us. So, you'd be able to be with Steve again."

Bucky swallowed. The bolt of longing felt like pain, with the wave of gut-freezing adrenaline it brought with it. "I don't want Steve."

Clint snorted. "Fuck you, you don't. Anyone with eyeballs can see how bad you got it for Steve. And he's so messed up with how much he wants you it hurts to look at. Like, literally hurts. You break my heart every time you're in the same fucking room."

"Then I'll make sure I'm not there when you're around."

Clint rolled his eyes. "Seriously? Jesus Christ. It's like you _want_ to be fucking miserable. Look," he said on a breath. "I get it. You think you wreck whatever you touch, especially other human beings. But it's not true. Just, let me try, okay?" He used his hands to inch himself closer. "Hang out with me for a few days. Nothing more than that, I promise. Just 'til you give yourself a chance to see that you can be in the same room as a sub and it'll be fine."

"Why do you even care?" He hadn't meant to sound so hopeless. "Why the hell does it matter so much if I'm not with Steve?"

"Because it _hurts,_ asshole." Clint sighed, shaking his head. "Because both of you are in so much fucking pain, and I can't stand it. No one can. You think the rest of the team doesn't know that you and Steve barely talk to each other? You think we can all just sit there and watch you two tearing yourselves apart and not give a shit? Steve's not just our leader, he's our _friend_. It fucking _sucks_ to see your friend hurting the way he is. And it's pretty obvious he can't go on like this. At some point the misery'll get too much and he'll break. Or he'll fuck up during a mission and someone's gonna die. Like him."

"He won't. That won't happen," Bucky said immediately, clipped with fear. "I'm not that important. He'll find someone else. He—"

"He crashed a plane into the goddam arctic like, a week after you fell out of the train. And before you tell me he had to do that…nope. He didn't. S.H.I.E.L.D. found the fucking plane, and Steve could've got out. He just never tried. And he's been walking around like someone keeps killing warehouses full of puppies in front of him. The only time I've ever seen him close to happy was for a couple days after psych cleared you and you moved in. So yeah, you're pretty fucking important, dumbass. And I am personally really, really over you two and your 'I'm gonna hurt him' bullshit. Newsflash: you are hurting him. And that's hurting us. And you, in case you hadn't noticed. And you just asked for help," he added, voice gentling. "You asked for help, and I want to give it to you."

Bucky swallowed, the back of his jaw aching with yet more tears he had no right to shed. "You can't help me."

Clint raised both his eyebrows. "'Can't'? Or, 'shouldn't'?" He slid himself that much closer, so that they were almost touching. "I'm not scared of you, Bucky. Let me help. I just want to help. That's it."

Bucky didn't deserve help any more than he deserved to cry for the pain he'd caused. Not after everything he'd done. He didn't know why Clint didn't understand that. He didn't know why Clint wasn't afraid of him. "I don't want to hurt you again."

"You didn't hurt me the first time," Clint said with more patience than Bucky would have ever guessed he owned. "You know you were trying to protect someone when you came at me, right? That's why I'm not scared of you," he went on when Bucky didn't answer. "You're a good Dom, Bucky. You just gotta remember that."

"I'm not." 

Clint sighed. "God, you are fucking stubborn." He took a deep breath, looked at Bucky again. "You _are_ a good Dom. Let me prove it to you." He gestured at the space around them. "The alternative is what you've been doing for weeks. That's no way to live. Is that what you want? More of this hiding and self-loathing shit?"

He deserved it, but that didn't mean he wanted it. Bucky shook his head. "I don't think you can fix me."

"No way in hell I can fix you. You're way too fucked up," Clint said cheerfully. "I'm not trying to fix you. I'm trying to be your friend." He held out his hand. "You gonna let me, or what?"

Bucky could barely manage a smile, but he clasped Clint's offered hand. "Yeah," he said, rough. "Yeah. I'll let you try."

"Awesome." Clint's grin was enormous, and just a little smug. "Now we can get someone down here to scrape us both off the floor."

* * *

**Text from Clint:** Guess who tamed a stray cat? \o/ \o/ \o/

 **Text from Nat:** I'm assuming you mean Bucky is letting you spend time with him?

 **Text from Clint:** CAW CAW MOTHERFUCKER

 **Text from Clint:** I mean yes Mam

 **Text from Clint:** Sorry

 **Text from Nat:** It's fine. I'll just punish you when I get home.

 **Text from Clint:** :D

 **Text from Nat:** You're incorrigible.

 **Text from Clint:** You love me.

 **Text from Nat:** Laura loves you. I admit I find you mildly amusing.

 **Text from Nat:** Congratulations, btw. I have to say I didn't expect it. ;)

 **Text from Clint:** Feral animals love me JUST LIKE YOU ;P

 **Text from Nat:** Maybe. :P

 **Text from Nat:** How did you manage to convince Bucky you were safe?

 **Text from Clint:** I may have broken my ankle

 **Text from Nat:** Explain.

 **Text from Clint:** My fault. He was runing 6 hrs treadmill smoking so I yelled to make him stop. He had a flashback I broke ankle getting away.

 **Text from Nat:** Did he hurt you????

 **Text from Clint:** No! He remembered me. thought I was Hydra frm b4, going to kill his sub

 **Text from Clint:** He didn't hurt me

 **Text from Clint:** He was v upset when he remembered

 **Text from Clint:** He begged me to help him

 **Text from Clint:** Nat?

 **Text from Clint:** Nat?

 **Text from Clint:** U mad?

 **Text from Nat:** I was trying to respond. You kept typing.

 **Text from Nat:** I want you to be safe.

 **Text from Clint:** I am! Really he was v O.O + D:

 **Text from Clint:** Reminded me of me

 **Text from Clint:** after loki

 **Text from Nat:** Do you need me to come home?

 **Text from Clint:** No Im fine

 **Text from Clint:** May I help Bucky?

 **Text from Nat:** What did Laura say?

 **Text from Clint:** Yes as long as its okay w you

 **Text from Nat:** Okay. Yes, as long as you are safe.

 **Text from Nat:** Promise me you'll be safe.

 **Text from Clint:** Yes Mam I promise.

 **Text from Nat:** Good.

 **Text from Nat:** I love you. I'll be home in a few days.

 **Text from Clint:** I know love you 2

 **Text from Nat:** I know. ;)

* * *

"I'm sorry to bother you, Bruce," Steve said as he shouldered his way through the lab door as it was still sliding open. "But I could use—oh."

"Oh dear. What happened?" The young woman—Jemma Simmons; Steve literally never forgot a name anymore—rushed across the room and took over putting pressure on the balled-up hand towel he'd slapped over his arm. She couldn't press nearly as hard as Steve could, but she walked backwards, tugging him towards the lab bench and the stool Bruce pulled out. "I'm just going to look underneath to see the extent of the damage." She carefully peeled back the towel, frowning a little at the deep line still oozing blood. "Thank you, Bruce," she murmured as he smacked the open first aid kit down next to her, then replaced the towel and looked up at Steve. "I'd recommend stitches, but with your metabolism you'll probably just need a few butterfly bandages."

Steve nodded. "Yeah, that'll be fine, thank you."

"What happened?" Bruce began automatically handing Jemma what she needed before she asked for it, then pinked a little when she graced him with an enormous smile.

"It was an accident. It's nothing." Steve looked away before Bruce saw the lie on his face. Steve could only be convincingly dishonest when it involved matters of life and death. He'd never managed to hide his stupidity.

"Oh dear," Jemma said quietly as she finished cleaning the cut. Steve had already washed it and he couldn't really get infections anymore anyway, but he appreciated her concern. He also knew better than to try and refuse. Dr. Jemma Simmons might be almost as tiny as Dr. Jane Foster, but her sweetness hid a quietly ferocious, exacting Domme who apparently controlled her sub with an iron hand. "I'm afraid it's quite obvious this was deliberate." She lifted her gentle eyes to his. "I won't have you lying to me, Steven. How did you cut yourself?" 

Steve bristled, aware that it was out of shame. "It doesn't matter." He fell just short of snapping at her. "It was an accident and it won't happen again."

Bruce sucked in a tiny gasp and backed up to the end of the table, then scuttled back to his work station. Steve might have smirked at how Bruce—who had at least ten years on Jemma, was nearly twice her size and could turn into the _Hulk_ —fled at the Domme's mild displeasure, but he was both too pissed and a little too worried.

"Good. I'm glad it won't happen again, or you shall answer to me." She glanced up again to give him a solid glare before she finished placing the bandage on his arm. She was so gentle he barely felt it.

 _Make me,_ Steve thought, but shoved that down. He didn't want anything from her like that. He didn't want anything from her at all. "You're not my Domme."

Steve saw Bruce's face go almost comically slack with horror out of the corner of his eye, but he just looked levelly back when Jemma's head snapped up to stare at him.

She blinked once. "Bruce, could you give us a moment?" she said, not taking her eyes from Steve.

"Yes, Doctor." Bruce escaped through the door separating his lab from Tony's.

Steve hated how his stomach dropped, now that he was completely alone with her.

"I am fully aware I'm not your Domme, Steven," she said, and there was no gentleness in her face or tone anymore. "Just as I'm aware that you haven't had anyone to dominate you since you were taken from the Arctic. This laceration is clearly the result of it." She smoothed the last bandage unnecessarily with her thumbs, but instead of letting go of him afterwards she slid her hands down to take his hand in both of hers. Her skin was cool against his. "It's fairly common for uncontrolled subs to attempt some kind of self-soothing. The problem is that it doesn't work, not in the long term. It also tends to escalate quickly. Tell me, how many times have you taken a knife to yourself in the past week?"

Steve gritted his teeth, locking away his automatic urge to answer. Anger flared in his chest, hot and pure. "None of your business. Thank you for your help," he said, and stood up to leave.

"Sit. Down."

She hadn't raised her voice, but the two words dropped Steve back onto the stool like she'd slugged him. She sounded like Peggy: all crisp accent and absolute command. Steve had never been able to resist Agent Carter; he'd never wanted to try. She and Bucky had shared him, after Azzano. Bucky had adored her, loved watching her turn Steve soft and compliant. Steve had even dared to imagine the three of them together, after the war.

Another thing he'd never get to have. But for a moment Jemma had been close enough to the magnificent Domme from his memories to all but undo him.

"That's better." Jemma smiled at him, ignoring the blush heating his skin from his scalp down his chest. "Don't move." She went to the battered couch along the far wall and grabbed a cushion, then returned and placed it at the base of the stool. "Kneel."

Steve did. His heart pounded wildly, slamming against his chest in a morass of need, anticipation, embarrassment and fear. But he bowed his head the instant she put her fingertips on his nape.

"Hands behind your back," she said quietly, and Steve clasped his wrists as if she'd put him in manacles. "Lovely. Just lovely." She stroked her fingers through his hair.

Steve gritted his teeth again, because he wanted to lean into her touch and jerk away at the same time. She wasn't his Domme. He barely knew her, not enough to feel safe. But her authority was intoxicating.

"How many times have you cut yourself in the past week?"

There was no possibility of not responding anymore. "Two."

"Speak up."

He swallowed. "Two, ma'am. It was two."

"Thank you. You will refer to me as 'Doctor', Steven."

"Yes, Doctor."

"Perfect." She squeezed his nape. Steve's head lolled forward as he relaxed a little under her hand. "And how long has it been since you submitted to someone?"

"I…I don't…Please—" He stopped, shaking his head mutely. He didn't even know what he was trying to say. Behind his back, his hands started to tremble.

"Shhh. It's all right, lovey." Jemma caressed his nape, petted his hair, rubbed the steel bands of his shoulders. 

It was so close to what he wanted, but it was wrong. She wasn't his Domme. _She wasn't his Domme._ His nerves were vibrating, crackling like heat under his skin. A sob caught him completely by surprise, and then he was crying, trembling violently under her hands. He was suddenly desperate to move. "Red. Red. Red. Please—"

She let go of him and he surged to his feet, gasping for air like he'd been drowning. He wiped his eyes frantically, feeling like the worst kind of stereotype of a weak, overwhelmed sub.

"Are you all right?" Jemma put her hand on his arm.

Steve flinched like she'd stabbed him. "I'm sorry, ma'am," he said immediately, shocked at his own rudeness. But just having her near him was making his skin crawl. "I can't. I can't. I'm sorry."

He realized too late that she'd told him to call her 'Doctor', but she didn't reprimand him. "Shh. Shh. It's fine. I understand." She came around so that she was facing him, looking up at his tear-streaked face and bloodshot eyes. "But you need to submit to someone, Steven. You can't keep going like this." She gestured at the newly-bandaged cut on his arm. "It doesn't matter that you can heal from injuries that would kill an ordinary person. Everyone has a breaking point." She grimaced sympathetically. "I rather think you've reached yours, but you're too strong and stubborn to recognize it." She reached for him again, but stopped herself and pulled her hand back. "Do you have anyone?"

Steve swallowed heavily, but he nodded. "Nat. Natasha." He hated how his voice creaked over her name. "She's on a mission."

Jemma blinked, maybe because she knew Nat was Clint's Domme. But she just nodded. "Will you go to her when she comes back, Steven?"

It was the same voice she'd used to make him submit to her, which meant she was expecting him to refuse otherwise.

He wanted to refuse. His Dom was Bucky. But he knew Jemma wouldn't accept another response than what she wanted to hear. So he cleared his eyes with the heel of his hand, then nodded. "Yes."

She smiled warmly at him, and Steve hated the quiet rush of pleasure that he'd pleased her. "Perfect. I'm so glad to hear that, Steven."

He couldn't make himself answer.

* * *

"So, uh, I really didn't mean for us to end up hanging out because of my ankle," Clint said. He leaned heavily on Bucky as he navigated the common floor, hopping on his one good leg.

"I know." Bucky helped Clint over to the couch, then pulled the coffee table closer so Clint could prop his foot on it. He wouldn't be at the 'walking cast' stage for another week.

"Should'a used your crutches. You need anything?" Bucky offered gracelessly as he stalked into the kitchen.

"Naw, I'm good." Clint glowered at his leg. "I fucking hate crutches." He twisted around on the couch to look at Bucky, who was banging around the kitchen like the appliances had offended him. Clint was pretty sure Bucky planned to beat a retreat back to his room as soon as he was comfortable, which he intended to prevent with extreme prejudice. He snatched up the controls for the gaming console and switched it on. "Wanna play?"

Bucky paused in his assault on the fridge. "You can play without me."

"It's a two person game, so I can't." Clint pulled up his most winsome smile when Bucky glanced at him, waggling his controller. "Come on. You know you want to." 

"No I don't."

Clint rolled his eyes. "Well, I know you want to, then." He gestured at the purple cast on his ankle. "I can't do anything else fun right now. I'm going crazy here." He widened his eyes. "Please, Bucky? As a friend?"

Bucky's mouth tightened in that line Clint had grown familiar with already.

"You said you'd let me try, remember?" he leapt in before Bucky could give words to the refusal doubtlessly already formed in the guilt swamp of his brain. "And I'll sit over here, see?" Clint shifted over, being careful of his ankle. "That way I'll totally have time to run if you try to kill me."

Bucky scowled at that, but his mouth loosened a little, like part of him was thinking of maybe cracking a smile, almost. Clint grinned. "Or are you just worried I'm gonna kick your ass in Mario Kart?"

"I don't even know what that is," Bucky said as he walked towards the couch. He handed Clint two pills and a glass of water. "Here. Take these."

Clint's ankle was only a little sore, but he obediently slapped the painkillers into his mouth and drank the entire glass. "Thanks."

"You're welcome." It barely even sounded grudging. Awesome. Bucky didn't squish himself into the far side of the couch when he sat down, either.

Clint refrained from fist pumping. "It's a driving game. There's even a steering wheel. You just, like, steer the car around the track."

Bucky squinted at the controller like he was looking for the detonator. "It's tiny. I'll crush it."

Clint tossed his like a frisbee into the half wall separating the living room from the kitchen, then caught it on the rebound. "No worries. They're made for little kids."

"Okay." Bucky took his little wheel with obvious trepidation, then held it like it was made of glass. "So, I just turn it? What're the buttons for?"

Clint shot him a big grin, because it was so fucking sad how certain Bucky was that he was going to break everything. "Yeah, you just turn it, pretty much. The buttons are kind of like a dashboard." He pointed things out on his own controller. "Push that one to make it go. We'll worry about the other ones later, once you're used to steering." He loaded the easiest race track, then gestured with his controller at the screen. "Hit the big glowy cubes for power ups. The glowy chevrons make you go faster, and that's about it. I'll go easy on you the first race or two."

Bucky nodded absently, frowning at the screen. "Is that a.... What the hell's driving?"

"I'm playing Donk. Um, the gorilla. And you're a turtle." The race began and they were off. 

"That's a turtle?" Bucky twitched the steering wheel. The turtle barely moved. "Why is a turtle racing a gorilla?"

"I honestly have no answer to that." Clint was steadily pulling ahead, but purposely didn't take too much of a lead. A random bomb helped slow him down without it looking deliberate.

"Are all games this weird nowadays?" Bucky was concentrating very hard on twitching his little driving turtle around the track. It was kind of adorable, not that Clint would ever say it.

"Naw, just the fun ones. Shit." Clint was run off the road by a baby riding a motorcycle.

Bucky smirked at his misfortune, the asshole. "If you say so, pal."

"You could try Minecraft, that's a building game. Or there're farming simulators. Or city management simulators." Clint snickered. "Or you could be a sentient piece of toast. Oh! I know! Goat simulator!" He started laughing, and three racers passed him. "Okay, yeah, all the games are weird," he conceded as he finished in 9th place.

"There're building games?" Bucky had come in fourth. Clint wasn't sure he'd noticed.

"Oh yeah." Clint nodded. "Minecraft is one of the most popular ones. You get to explore a world, mine stuff, grow food, build things, and design crazy machines that mine or grow stuff for you."

"Really? That sounds…." Bucky gave his head a quick shake. "Never mind. We gonna race again, or what?"

"The world's not going to end if you let yourself have fun, dumbass." Clint started the next race. "You notice the world's not ending, right?"

"Who says I'm having fun?" Bucky shot back, but then whooped in triumph when he passed two racers on the first lap.

"Fuck you. Hit that glowy cube."

Bucky did. He had a tight little grin that Clint had seen on him when he sparred or used the practice range. "It's sorta like a flight simulator."

"Exactly!" It was cool, the way Bucky had managed to fit the admittedly weirdass game with something he knew. "We've got those too, but the one for this console will drive you nuts. There're better ones out there if you're interested. Hit that trigger on the back of your steering wheel. It will throw banana peels on the track."

Bucky quirked an eyebrow at Clint, but he hit the trigger and spewed banana peels behind his car. Clint made sure to drive over them, then grinned as his car spun out. "Perfect. Okay, now hit another glowy cube. Mushrooms! Cool, those make you go faster."

"This is wacky," Bucky murmured, but he was still smiling, and it even widened a bit as he passed another racer. "This is the whole game?"

"The levels get harder, but yeah. Pretty much. You get the cubes with the random power ups in them, and you try to win."

"We should make bets or something." Bucky ran into the next glowy cube with the kind of methodical dedication Clint recognized from Avengers missions, but he laughed when his power up hit Clint's car and he spun out of control.

It was a good laugh, and Clint was so stunned to hear it he let his car spin right off the course. "Aw, fuck."

"Don't worry, I'll go easy on you." Bucky gave him a full-on smug grin.

Clint snorted as he set up another race at a higher level. "Asshole." 

Bucky smirked. "Little punk."

"Who you callin' little?" Clint sassed, thrilled at Bucky's reaction.

"You. 'Cause you're…." Bucky clammed up all at once.

Clint cursed inwardly. _Way to go, Barton. Remind him of Steve._ He let out a breath and focused on the screen.

Bucky beat Clint again, but it was like all the fun had been sucked out of the room. He turned the wheel over and over in his hands. "Right. Good, um. Good game."

"Wanna try again?" It was probably a long shot, but Bucky had been okay just a minute ago. And Laura liked it when he distracted her when she was upset, or at least she liked that he was trying. That was the kind of thing that friends did, anyway.

"I should probably get going," Bucky said. But he just fiddled with his controller like he didn't really want to leave. And he was right back to being so fucking sad.

"Um, movie and popcorn?" Clint asked. 

Bucky looked at him. "Do you need me to stay?"

Dammit, now Clint didn't know if he was pressuring Bucky when he wanted to escape. He shook his head. "No man, it's cool. You don't have to stay."

Bucky stared at him for a moment, then flipped the control onto the couch cushion between them before closing his eyes and rubbing at his forehead. "Clint, you gotta tell me what you need, here. I can't...I have to know what you need."

Clint slapped his controller down on the coffee table. "I need you to tell me what you want. I don't know you that well, and you're really good at the…." He waved his hand in front of his face. "Stoic shit. If you want to go, no problem." He took a deep breath, thinking of how proud his Dommes would be of him for being honest. "I don't like being alone when I'm laid up." He gestured at his ankle. "But it's cool if you need to bail, swear to God."

Bucky looked at him like he was trying to decode something in Clint's expression, "If you need me to stay, I can. It's fine." 

Clint would've given just about anything to know what Bucky was really thinking. "You sure?"

Bucky nodded.

 _Never doubt your Dom._ That'd literally been beaten into him years ago. And both Nat and Laura had taught him to take people at face value or he'd go out of his mind. "Great." He grabbed the remote. "All right: stupid car race comedy, transforming robots fighting each other, or giant robots fighting giant monsters?"

Bucky just shrugged. "You choose. I haven't seen any of 'em."

Clint gritted his teeth and reminded himself not to make himself crazy with second-guessing. He put in _Smokey and the Bandit_ , because the plot required the least effort of any of them and especially because nobody died in it. Bucky's mood had crashed hard enough that Clint figured even dead robots would probably suck. "Okay, just so you know, there are absolutely no redeeming points to this at all. It's just stupid car stunts."

"Sounds great." Bucky smiled, but it was clear his heart wasn't in it.

Clint looked at Bucky, then shifted to get up. He'd promised popcorn so he figured he should get it. He was well aware he shouldn't be walking without his crutches, but he'd broken his ankle enough times that he knew it'd be okay to walk a short distance. And Natasha loved it when Clint served her. Though she would've been pissed if he put weight on his ankle, come to think.

Bucky had been staring at his fisted hands. Whatever he'd been thinking of, he only seemed to realize Clint was moving when he stood up. Bucky shot up immediately, all but shoving Clint back onto the couch. "What are you doing?"

"It's fine," Clint said quickly. "I can walk a bit. I've done it before."

"You shouldn't, though. It'll make it heal slower." He frowned. "Damn it, why didn't you say anything?"

Clint shrugged. "I was just going to the kitchen."

Bucky dragged the coffee table closer. "Idiot," he muttered. "Rebreaking your fucking ankle for some goddam soda…." He grabbed one of the couch cushions and put it on the table, then pointed at it. "Put your foot on that."

"I'm fine," Clint said again, though he did as he was told. Bucky was pissed at him, just like Nat would've been. Whoops. Clint's instinct was to retreat back to his floor, but he crushed that. He was safe with Bucky, even if Bucky himself didn't know that.

"You're not fine," Bucky said. He let out a breath. "I know…I know I'm no one's idea of a good…" He winced. "Of a good anything, anymore. But I still know how to take care of a sub, okay? And you don't let 'em wander around when they're hurt."

"Thank you."

Bucky shook his head. "Don't thank me. I should've been looking after you already."

"You were," Clint protested, meaning the company. But Bucky just shook his head again.

"I didn't even check if you were comfortable." Bucky adjusted Clint's leg on the cushion with clinical precision, then added a throw pillow to elevate his ankle higher. It was actually kind of sweet. "You're like Steve," Bucky groused. "I had to tie him down once, because the stupid idiot refused to stay put when he had three bullets in him."

That startled a laugh out of Clint. "You really had to tie him down?"

Bucky nodded, his mouth quirking in something almost like one of his smiles during the game. "Yeah."

"Oh man, I bet that went over like a lead balloon."

"He loved it," Bucky said simply. His smile widened a little. "The more rugged it got, the more he figured he'd won. I'd tell him what to do, and he'd say, 'Make me'. And then I'd have to wrestle the punk down." He smirked. "When he got shot, I ended up having to wrap him like a fucking mummy, just to keep him still. And the whole time he's grinning at me like Brer Rabbit in the briar patch."

Clint laughed out loud. "Seriously? I would've loved to see that."

"It was something." Bucky looked at his left hand, pulled it into a fist. "That was a long time ago." He wasn't smiling anymore.

"Would you mind getting me a soda, since you won't let me move?" Clint grinned with as much fake innocence as he could, trying to distract Bucky out of his misery. "And the popcorn. There's a bag of it in one of the cupboards."

Bucky blinked himself back to the present, "Sure." He got up and went into the kitchen. "What kind you want?" The fridge rattled as it opened. "All we got is Tony's hipster shit."

Clint chuckled, relaxing. "Cream soda."

He heard clinking and then Bucky pouring popcorn into a bowl. Bucky came back with two sodas and a big bowl full of popcorn. He put the bowl on the table, then deftly flicked the cap off the bottles with his left thumb. "Here." He handed Clint's to him. "Do you need anything else?"

"I've got food, drink, movie, foot's up. Um, I think I'm good?" Clint drank his soda; he could practically taste the ridiculous amount of money Tony had paid for it. "Thanks. It feels weird, though. I'm usually on the other side of this."

"No decent Dom's gonna let their sub hurt themselves." Bucky checked Clint over again as he sat down. "Do your Dommes make you do everything even when you're injured?"

Clint winced. Nat and Laura were the best Dommes he'd ever had. The last thing he wanted was to make it look like they didn't take care of him. "No, of course not." 

Bucky looked confused, and maybe even a little hurt. "Then what were you trying to pull?" 

"Nothing!" Clint said quickly. He shrugged. "It's just automatic, I guess. I'm a sub, you know?" Clint internally rolled his eyes at himself. Duh. "I do the same thing with Tony. I mean, I'm just, um...I'm used to serving my Doms no matter what. Not Nat or Laura," he added quickly. "But, they were the first who didn't expect it. When I'm not with them, I forget. Sometimes." 

Bucky relaxed. "Doms are supposed to take care of their subs. End of story. You give them what they need, and that means looking after them when they can't, even if they're the ones looking after you the rest of the time. And I know you belong to Nat. But I'm here and she ain't. And I'm not going to let you strain your fucking ankle because you're used to it."

Clint scrubbed his hand over the back of his neck, partially because it let him duck his head without actually doing it. "Sorry, I wasn't trying to insult you." 

"You're welcome. And you don't have to apologize." Bucky sighed and slumped back against the couch with his hands curled loosely on his thighs. "Tony'd do this stuff too, you know. He's not the world's greatest Dom, when he even feels like being one. But he'd still take care of you." Bucky turned his head enough to eye Clint suspiciously. "If I didn't know better, I'd think you were doing it on purpose to get a rise out of me. You do that to Nat? 'Cause I can't believe she'd let you get away with crap like that."

Clint grinned, relaxing. "How much, exactly, do you think Nat lets me get away with?"

It was a relief to see Bucky smile, even if it still couldn't match his earlier contentment. "More than I let Steve get away with."

"Yeah, but it sounds like he's a shit. Me, I'm the model of decorum." Clint laughed.

Bucky didn't laugh. "I don't know what he is, anymore."

"We're all different than we used to be," Clint said gently. "If you saw me fifteen years ago—"

"You would've been, what? Sixteen?" Bucky cut him off. "Fifteen years ago, I was in a tube of ice in the basement of some Hydra facility."

Clint flinched. "Sorry."

"Not your fault." Bucky took a long drink. "If I saw you one year ago," he continued softly, "I would've killed you without even thinking about it."

Clint's voice was just as soft. "I almost killed Nat."

"You'd been ordered to. She would've killed you. I know that."

"But she didn't, you know?"

Bucky nodded distantly. "You didn't either."

"I was so close to it. I'd calculated windage, drop, all of it."

Bucky looked at him, genuinely curious. "So, why didn't you?"

Clint rolled the soda bottle back and forth between his palms. "That's the part that haunts me. I don't really know. I was just...something inside said not to do it. I've only ever felt like that a few times in my life, and when I've ignored it things didn't go so well. So I put the arrow a foot and a half to her side and went to find her." He took a drink. "She found me first."

"You got good instincts."

Clint looked him in the eye. "Yeah, I do."

Bucky looked away, curling his hands into fists. He shook his head. "Subs around me get hurt. You shouldn't trust me."

"I already trust you with my life, dumbass." Clint said.

"You shouldn't," Bucky repeated. He swallowed. "I won't be able to live with myself if I hurt you."

Clint nodded. "I know. Just like I know you won't."

"I already hurt you."

"For the last time, I hurt _myself_. After I accidentally sent you into a _flashback_." Clint rolled his eyes. "You do remember that you didn't actually lay a hand on me, right? I mean, I know you're brain damaged and all, but you don't seem to be that far gone.

Bucky's glare was entirely without heat.

"I'm not going to leave, Bucky," Clint said seriously. "I'm not. Not unless I know you really want me to. I'm your friend. I'm going to be here tomorrow, and the day after that and the day after that."

"You're an idiot."

"I know," Clint said easily. He smiled. "Crazy, too."

"Guess I am too, then." Bucky sighed. "An idiot, I mean. I know I'm crazy."

Clint shrugged. "Don't think I know anyone who isn't crazy. Except Laura. Then again, Laura took _me._ "

"Aw, you're not so bad." Bucky answered Clint's shy smile with a tiny one of his own, but then he stood. "I can't stay put any more." He sounded apologetic. "I was thinking of going downstairs to the gym. Go running. I'd ask you to come, but.…" 

Clint started to get to his feet, quietly thrilled at the invitation. "No, that's fine. I can—"

"Don't move," Bucky ordered. "What I _want_ is for you to stay off your ankle. If you need anything, tell J.A.R.V.I.S. to get me for you." 

Bucky's voice was that perfect combination of command and concern to practically make Clint purr. "Yessir."

"Good."

The praise made Clint smile.

* * *

One of the many luxuries of living in Avengers Tower was that the gym wasn't just a gym. It connected to a genuine police-style range on one side, and something like an arena on the other. Normally it was used for sparring practice, though Tony had set it up to produce obstacles and hazards on command.

Bucky could hear that someone was using the arena room as soon as he walked off the elevator: a particular _swish—clang—swish_ that he knew as well as the soft _whir_ of his arm, and that stopped him dead in his tracks and almost made him turn around and leave.

Steve, throwing his shield around.

Bucky glanced at the heavy bag, hanging innocently near the salmon ladder and a small army of practice dummies. He _could_ leave, or he could ignore Steve and just go ahead and hit something the way he'd planned. He already had his flesh and bone hand wrapped, and he had as much right to be there as anyone. It was ridiculous that he'd let Steve's presence chase him away.

But he was afraid. He knew it was stupid. He wasn't a damn kid, to be standing there with his heart pounding just at the thought of Steve being nearby. Bucky had spent at least an hour on the same couch as Clint, and he hadn't hurt him. Surely he could spend an hour on the same floor as another sub without it leading to some fucking disaster, right? Even if the sub was Steve?

"Fucking coward," he hissed at himself in Russian. Always in Russian. But it was what made him yank his shoulders back and go into the practice room.

Steve was wearing his Captain America suit, everything except the helmet, which meant that this wasn't practice so much as hardcore battle prep. He threw his shield at the far end of the room. As it flew, metal projections popped out of the floor, ceiling and walls apparently at random. The shield hit a long cylinder and shot straight up to collide with a thin bar. It came flying back towards Steve upside down and wobbling, and he had to dive to catch it before it hit the ground. The instant it was in his hand he rolled, shot up to his feet and winged it at the far end of the room again.

He looked amazing. Beautiful. All leonine grace and focused strength. This time the shield took a bad ricochet and Steve had to run and leap to catch it, but he saw Bucky and was surprised enough that he missed. The shield sailed just beyond the reach of his fingertips.

Bucky caught it with his left hand, spun with the momentum and threw it back into the shifting projections at the end of the room.

It was clear Steve didn't expect that any more than he'd expected to see Bucky at all. But he was nothing if not swift on the uptake, and when the shield took a bad ricochet off a triangle he leapt for it like a damn baseball outfielder. He snatched it out of the air, whirled and threw it almost faster than Bucky could see.

The shield _spanged_ off a projection and then the back wall and then practically flew into Bucky's outstretched arm. He grinned and lobbed it back, anticipating where the metal shapes might pop out next for it to hit against with a reflex so ingrained he barely registered it. He wasn't exact—of course not, it was random—but he was close enough that Steve only had to run a couple steps to catch the shield. Steve laughed and threw the shield again.

The game was on after that.

The unspoken rules went from trying to get the shield to each other to trying to make it impossible to catch pretty quickly, which didn't surprise Bucky at all. Steve had always been a little shit, just like Clint said, and Bucky prided himself on giving back as good as he got. He also started showing off just for the hell of it, turning his catches into flips and aerial spins meant to impress as much as make his return throws difficult to track.

He had no idea how long the game went on, but even if he was Steve's equal in strength and stamina, the shield had been practically glued to Steve's arm since 1943, and it was finally Bucky who just missed snatching it as it careened by. He spun around to follow its trajectory, only to see it embed itself in the wall next to the door he'd come in.

"Oh, fuck."

Steve burst out laughing, doubled over with it. Bucky couldn't help laughing with him, even though he didn't think he really got the joke.

"What's so funny? Aside from how Tony's going to kill us?"

"Oh my God. Your _face._ " Steve was still laughing. He straightened, wiping his eyes. "Remember when you stole candy that one time on a dare, and you tried to climb over the cemetery fence to escape Mr. Morrison when he came after you, and a spike went through the seat of your pants and trapped you like in the [Charlie Chaplin movie?](https://goo.gl/OJAqRT) Well, you looked exactly like you did then when the shield hit the wall."

Bucky smirked. "At least Tony's not gonna march me home for my mom to tan my ass."

Steve laughed again, delighted, and Bucky went closer to him, as helpless to stop himself as a comet being pulled into the sun. "Tony would probably demand that you tan _his_ ass in compensation."

"Oh yeah?" Bucky took another step and they were so close now he could feel the heat from Steve's body. He'd barely have to lift his hand for them to touch. "Maybe I should tan your ass for making me miss."

"Maybe you should," Steve said, and it could've been a joke, except for how the high color on Steve's cheeks deepened, and how his pupils went wide, crowding the blue of his eyes into a thin ring. His desire was so palpable Bucky could practically smell it. Taste it.

Bucky wanted to. He wanted Steve—

 _What are you doing? What are you_ doing? __

_You'll hurt him._

_You do not dominate, little soldier. You obey._

Bucky swallowed, feeling like he was shoving his heart down out of his throat. "Or maybe I should march you to Tony so you can fess up that it's your fault." His voice creaked like a hinge.

Steve grinned with all his teeth. "Make me."

Bucky had no idea how much of the terrible bolt of fear registered on his face, but Steve actually backed up a step. "Bucky, what is it? What happened?"

"No," Bucky said over the heavy thud of his pulse in his ears. "I can't. I won't hurt you. Don't make me hurt you." He'd lapsed into Russian; he wrenched his mind back to the present. "Don't make me hurt you," he repeated in English.

"It's okay, Bucky. It's okay. I won't. I don't want you to do anything except not leave. Please don't leave, Bucky."

Steve reached for him and Bucky flinched, making a small, awful noise of fear. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Steve. I love you, but—" He clenched his teeth on the words shoving at the backs of his teeth, because if he kept talking he'd stay with Steve, and then God only knew what he might do.

 _You didn't hurt Clint._ But Clint wasn't Steve. Clint was a friend, maybe, if Bucky could even remember how to be one anymore. But Steve was more precious to Bucky than his own life. And Bucky destroyed anyone who was precious to him.

Steve looked at him the way he had on the helicarrier, when he'd begged him not to fight. "Bucky, don't. Don't leave. Not again, please…!"

"I love you. I'm sorry." Bucky turned and left, again.

* * *

Steve watched Bucky go with his hands curled into fists and his chest heaving in a gruesome mess of misery and rage. He wanted to run after him, grab his arms, force him to just fucking _stay_ for once and talk to him. There was no reason for Bucky to be so afraid. How could he not understand that he didn't have to be afraid?

 _I love you_ , Bucky said. Maybe he still did, but what the fuck good did that do when Bucky could barely handle looking at him?

Steve stalked over to his shield and yanked it out of the wall, slipping it automatically onto his arm. Then he smashed the edge into the wall over and over again, howling wordlessly in anger. He didn't stop until he punched through the two-foot thick concrete and steel.

"Fuck." He raked his fingers through his hair, scattering dust and sweat. "J.A.R.V.I.S., please have Tony take the money to repair the wall from my funds. And please give him my apologies for acting like a child."

"Certainly, captain," J.A.R.V.I.S. said with a tone that somehow implied he was used to the tower residents breaking things in fits of emotion. "Sir would like me to inform you that you needn't concern yourself with the cost of repair. Apparently the pleasure of 'seeing Captain Angelic going apeshit' was more than adequate compensation. Sir would also like to know if there is anything he can do to help," J.A.R.V.I.S. added a moment later, sounding much more sincere.

Steve took a deep breath. "Tell him thanks about the repair cost, but I insist." He didn't bother adding a reminder about privacy, since he knew all common areas of the tower were monitored and Tony barely understood the concept anyway. "And thank him for his offer, but I'd just like to be alone."

"Yes, captain. Sir says that if you change your mind, the couch in his workshop is currently unoccupied."

Steve managed a twitch of the smile for the A.I., but a moment later he sagged against the wall, letting his head fall back in defeat. He let his shield clunk to the floor, then put his hand over his upper arm. He couldn't feel the almost-healed wound through his uniform sleeve, but he knew it was there. It offered some minute comfort. And he still had the knife.

"No," Steve muttered out loud, shaking his head as if he were in a real conversation. He hadn't actually told Jemma he wouldn't cut himself again, but the last thing he wanted was to make another dumb mistake and end up needing first aid. Natasha was supposed to be back in a week. He could wait. He would wait.

He'd waited 70 years. A few more days wouldn't be anything.

* * *

Bucky didn't actually intend to fall asleep in the common room.

He'd rushed back to his—Steve's—suite and dove into a three-minute shower, cursing himself for an idiot and a coward the whole time. At least he remembered to turn the hot water on, even if part of him snarled that he didn't deserve it.

He barely took the time to dry off before he grabbed the nearest clean clothes and his Starktab and left. He forced himself to write Steve a note, saying he would be in the common room. He thought about finishing it with, "I love you", but using the words again made him feel overwhelmed and raw as an open wound. In the end he just signed his name.

He didn't want to read; the tablet was as much a prop as anything, though Bucky didn't know if it was for his own psyche or just to give him a reasonable excuse to not be on his floor. 

Clint was asleep on the couch, face down with his boots hanging off the edge.

Bucky froze just outside the elevator. "Fuck," he muttered to himself. But the only other place to go was back to Steve's place, and Steve would have to return at some point and...He couldn't deal with Steve again. Not right now.

Clint snuffled in his sleep, and started to drool onto his pillow. It was oddly endearing, but it was really the comforting normalcy of it that let Bucky think with more than leashed panic. He hadn't hurt Clint since the gym. He gripped that in his mind like a talisman now as he sat very quietly in the armchair he liked because it was nearest to the stairs. He thumbed on his tablet and opened it to A History of S.H.I.E.L.D.: From the SSR to the Fall of Hydra. He'd chosen that book out of a morbid curiosity over how he might've helped Hydra infiltrate S.H.I.E.L.D. It probably wasn't healthy, this obsessive interest in discovering where he'd been used to fuck up the world. But part of him was viciously satisfied whenever he read about an incident that he knew he'd had a part in.

Salt in the wounds, obviously. It didn't make him stop.

It didn't keep him awake either, it turned out.

He woke up to the dissipating wisps of another nightmare, fear still rattling in his chest though all he could remember clearly was the horrible certainty he was about to be punished. At least the lights were still on, so Bucky was only disoriented and terrified for a second or two before he knew where he was.

Clint was gone and Bucky's Starktab was on the coffee table, screen black, along with a paperback with a small plate on it, holding two cookies and a note.

_I didn't make these. Darcy bought two dozen stupidly healthy cookies at a vegan bakery for some reason then decided they 'tasted like crunchy straw'. I didn't want to ask her why she knows what straw tastes like._

_I think they're pretty good. But I DID NOT MAKE THEM FOR YOU OKAY? And maybe you'll think they taste like straw too. Maybe you ate straw before just like Darcy. After all you can be a real ass._

_Try not to puke on the book if you need to hurl, because it's not for you either. I want it back._

_Clint._

Bucky grinned at the note. He put the cookies aside, promising himself he'd eat them later no matter how disgusting they might be.

The book was called A Brief History of Time. The blurb on the cover talked about cosmological physics and astrophysics. Not something Bucky had expected. Clint was definitely a comic-book and adventure novel kind of guy, but he was also smarter than he let on. Bucky wouldn't have pegged him for someone interested in this kind of science, though. Then again, not too many people would've pegged Bucky as being interested in this kind of science either. Interesting that Clint had. Maybe it was because they were both excellent snipers. You had to have a grasp of physics for that.

Bucky picked up the book and started reading it. The first few chapters were well worn, but the paper got progressively crisper towards the back of the book, like Clint had read the first part over and over but then kept stalling out. 

By the time Bucky had worked his way through the first three chapters, he'd eaten the two cookies Clint left for him, then six more when he'd hunted down the box in the kitchen. Darcy was full of crap—the cookies were delicious.

The concepts in the book were difficult as _fuck_. A lot of it hadn't even been discovered before the war, and Bucky kept having to stop to look things up on the tablet. It felt a little weird. Forbidden, even, studying something academic. This wasn't like learning a new language or how to pick a lock or kill someone and make it look like an accident. Bucky couldn't do anything with this knowledge. It was useless to him.

But it was interesting. Really, really interesting. Bucky hadn't been mentally challenged like this in a very long time. And he hadn't learned anything just for the sake of _knowing_ it in longer than he could remember. He hadn't been allowed.

A Brief History of Time was difficult as fuck and Bucky worked his way through it and ate Darcy's hand-me-down cookies. And he looked up physics on his tablet instead of reading about his crimes, and he remembered what it felt like to learn something just because he wanted to. He liked it. He liked how that felt a lot.

He stayed up all night reading it, mostly by accident. But if that meant he avoided more nightmares…well, he wasn't going to complain.

* * *

Bucky returned the book the next morning, after he'd downloaded his own copy onto his tablet.

Clint answered his door on his crutches, wearing only jeans and his collar.

Bucky blinked. "I thought Nat wasn't coming home until next week," he said, which was better than blurting something about how good Clint looked like that.

"She is." Clint blinked right back at him, then noticed how Bucky's eyes kept dropping to the base of his neck and blushed almost as prettily as Steve did. "She, uh, likes me to wear it when she's away."

"Looks good on you," Bucky said, then wrenched his eyes up to Clint's face. "Um. Here." He managed to not actually shove the book at him. "Thanks."

Clint took it awkwardly but managed to hold it and his crutches. "You didn't like it?"

"No, I did. I really did," Bucky said quickly, because Clint looked disappointed. "I uh, I actually stayed up last night reading it." He shrugged at Clint's wide eyes, suddenly feeling a little embarrassed about that. "I don't need to sleep much and I read fast. You know, the serum...It makes things easier." He gave a self-depreciating smirk. "I guess it's good for something."

"I'm glad to hear it. I was wondering what the hell good you were." Clint grinned at Bucky's mild glare. "I'm happy you liked it. I have the sequels too, if you want. I haven't even gotten to them."

Bucky gaped. "There're _sequels?_ "

Clint nodded, his grin widening at Bucky's enthusiasm. "Two."

Bucky's hands were practically twitching. "Could I borrow 'em?"

"Sure. Hang on a sec." Clint hesitated, levering himself back from the door on his crutches. "Do you want to come in? Or…?"

Bucky's eyes swept down to Clint's naked chest then back up to his face via the collar, and he retreated a step. The blatant symbol of Clint's submission made the idea of entering his space too dangerous. Only idiots took wild animals into their homes. "No, that's fine."

Clint rolled his eyes. "I'm allowed to have friends over when my Domme's not here. Nat's not gonna come back and challenge you to a duel or anything."

"I know," Bucky said seriously. "It's not that."

Clint stared at him a moment longer, but when Bucky didn't offer an explanation he just shook his head. "I'll get the books. You can stand out here like a stalky ex-boyfriend, then."

His casual insult made Bucky feel better, somehow, like Clint had given tacit approval of his choice by not making more of it. Bucky relaxed again as Clint disappeared deeper into his home.

Clint came back a couple minutes later with a plastic bag dangling from one hand, banging against his right crutch as he stumped along. "Here."

Bucky took the bag and looked inside. The two books were obviously new. "You don't mind if I take these? Really?"

Clint tilted his head dismissively. "It's not like I'm going to get to them any time soon."

"Thanks, Clint." Bucky grinned, then frowned in confusion. "What?"

"Nothing," Clint said quickly. "It's just…I think that's the first time I've ever really seen you smile."

"I've smiled around you before."

"I know." Clint nodded. "But not like this. You look happy. Like, happy-happy. Not just sort of happy." He grinned. "It looks good on you. Way better than that mopey shit."

"Fuck you," Bucky said, but he was still smiling. He couldn't help it.

* * *

By that evening, Bucky had devoured nearly half of the first book, despite how often he'd needed to put it down and literally learn about what he'd just read. Around two am he forced himself to put it down so he could go to bed. But he actually managed four hours of sleep in a row, dreaming about strings vibrating music into the universe instead of rooms soaked in blood.

* * *

"It's been, like, a week. You're already on book _three?_ "

Bucky blinked himself away from quantum mechanics to grin hello at Clint when he crutched his way into the common room, only to frown when he saw that instead of sitting on the couch, Clint was headed into the kitchen. "Sit down."

Clint shook his head. "I'm hungry. I was just gonna get—"

"Not on that ankle. Sit down." 

Clint huffed, but stopped arguing. Instead he grabbed a cushion off the couch and tossed it on the floor, then maneuvered himself to sit on it. He reached behind him to snatch a throw pillow and put his outstretched foot on it.

Bucky glowered to cover the sudden lash of fear, reminding himself fiercely that Clint wasn't kneeling; it was fine. Everything was fine. "I didn't tell you to do that."

"No shit," Clint said easily. "'Coffee table's at a bad height. It puts a lot of strain on my knee. This is easier, that's all. Don't get your Dom undies in a twist. I'm not doing it for you." He gestured at the pile of comic books and the remotes on the lower shelf of the coffee table. "See?"

"Yeah." Bucky relaxed. "What'd you want?"

"Pizza. I'm not too proud to eat frozen if there aren't any leftovers."

Bucky smirked and went into the kitchen. Unsurprisingly, there were two leftover pizza boxes in the fridge. He grabbed two slices of pepperoni, then thought of Natasha and took a third one that had some vegetables on it. He didn't know if Clint was still taking painkillers or not, but asking felt wrong, both because it was too much like what a real Dom would do and because a real Dom should've already known. Even Bucky could see how stupid that no-win situation was, but he just bypassed the microbrews and got Clint a root beer instead.

He put the plate and bottle down on the floor next to Clint, nodded in answer to his thanks, and went back to his reading.

"Hey, Bucky."

Bucky looked up, blinking away the hypotheses spinning like atoms behind his eyes. "Yeah?"

Clint jutted his chin at the book in Bucky's lap, the Starktab balanced on the chair arm beside it. "Do you really understand all that stuff?"

"Mostly." Bucky glanced at the book, thinking about all the crisp pages of the first one he'd read, and how Clint hadn't touched the next two at all. "I've had to look up a lot of it. Why?"

Clint grimaced. "Most physics makes sense to me. I can pick it up from a textbook, or watch some videos or something. But that…" He gestured at the book with the pizza crust in his hand. "It doesn't make any sense."

Bucky shrugged. "You're trying to connect it to stuff you know."

"Well, yeah," Clint said as if it were obvious. "How else am I gonna figure it out?"

Bucky shook his head. "That's the thing. You can't think like that. The problem is, the stuff he's talking about is infinitesimally small. You've got to throw out a lot of your expectations. It's like shooting .50 caliber bullets all your life, and then expecting a .22 to react the same way. You know how they bounce, right?"

"Yeah. Sure." Clint nodded. "It's like, ping pong. Half the time you don't even find an exit hole, or if you do it's not even close to the entrance wound." He blinked, then grinned, getting the analogy. "So you're saying that stuff doesn't scale. Okay, I got that. Cool. But what the hell is a quanta?"

Quanta led to photons, which led to Hawking radiation. That led to Bucky moving from the armchair to the couch, to make it easier for Clint to see the diagrams in the book. Clint kept leaning over to point things out in the book, putting one hand on the floor so he didn't tip into Bucky's leg. Eventually he stopped bothering and rested his head on Bucky's thigh. 

They stayed long enough that Bucky got up to get them more leftovers, Thai this time. The food was unfamiliar but tasty, and while they ate Clint told Bucky a hilarious story about eating a salsa and peanut butter sandwich on a dare. Bucky told Clint about the 107th resting in a village in Italy, and a tiny, scrawny, bantam rooster he'd called 'Steve' because of how ornery it was. Steve the rooster had taken an instant and violent dislike to a corporal who thought the best way to get the Italian Dommes' attention was by being a creepy asshole, and Bucky specifically made it the corporal's job to collect the eggs until he apologized.

Clint laughed and asked for more stories, then once Bucky cleared the dishes they went back to the impromptu lesson. Clint was almost completely self-taught, with large gaps in his understanding, but he was smart and eager to learn. Bucky was surprised at how much he enjoyed teaching, even if half the time he needed to use his Starktab to look things up himself.

And then Bucky realized that at some point during his explanations, he'd begun petting Clint's head—with his left hand—where Clint was leaning against his thigh. Clint was practically boneless, nuzzling Bucky's leg just a little with one arm casually wrapped around Bucky's calf.

Bucky jolted like he'd been electrocuted and snatched his weaponized arm a safe distance away.

"Everything's fine, Bucky," Clint said softly. "You didn't hurt me."

"I know." Bucky swallowed. He hadn't. But he might.

He shifted away. Not too far, but enough that Clint had to sit up. It was a friendly distance, still, but not an intimate one.

He ignored Clint's tiny sigh and went back to the lesson. 

Clint didn't touch him again. Bucky told himself he was glad for it.

* * *

Except.

Except he should've guessed he couldn't spend one good day with a sub without ending up having a fucking nightmare.

All he'd done was explain some physics stuff to Clint. That was _it_. He'd barely even touched him. But of course Bucky had a nightmare anyway.

Normally if he dreamed about Steve, it'd be Bucky trying to get to Steve before he died. In those dreams Bucky kept getting lost, or he'd get to the door of the apartment and realize he'd left the medicine behind; or that they'd moved back to his parents' apartment and he was at the wrong building; or he'd lost the key. He always knew Steve would die before he reached him.

Lately, he'd been dreaming a lot about trying to find Steve in the Potomac before he drowned. Of course he never could.

Tonight, Bucky dreamed about the forest.

This time, in the sick morass that was his brain these days, it was 1943, just a few hours after he'd marched into the camp at Steve's side. It was night. Late. He and Steve were out in the woods surrounding the camp, close enough to hear the occasional shout or loud burst of laughter.

Steve's shirt was off, his hands gripping a tree branch above his head. The broad, unfamiliar plane of his back was silvery grey under the weak glow of the moon. They hadn't brought any light with them, because no one else could know they were here. Steve had led Bucky, at first. His hand was too large and too warm, wrapped around Bucky's like a stranger's. Even Steve's hair was different, thicker and blonder now. When Steve had found him in Zola's isolation ward, the only part Bucky had immediately recognized were his eyes.

Right now Bucky could only see Steve's back: the hint of his ribs and the vulnerable valley of his spine. When Bucky whipped him, the curving welt his belt left was a dark line of blood. Steve gasped in shock and pain.

Bucky belted him again. And again. When it'd happened for real, he'd lost control so badly that it'd taken at least an hour before he even realized he'd drawn blood. And he'd stopped immediately and never, ever, done it again.

In the nightmare, he just kept going. He belted Steve until his flesh hung in strips and Bucky could see the white gleam of vertebrae and ribs. He belted Steve until he was dead, and then Bucky realized that Steve had the body he used to before the war, not the one he had now. Instead of protecting his precious, fragile submissive, Bucky had torn him apart.

He woke himself up screaming Steve's name.

The door to his room flew open and Steve rushed in. "Bucky! You were screaming—are you okay?"

Bucky leapt off the bed and all but threw himself at Steve. Steve backed up so fast he hit the doorframe, arms up like he thought he'd have to defend himself.

Bucky froze. "I'm sorry," he said, voice gravelly with the fear still clinging to him. "I dreamed I…I dreamed you were dead. And…" He took a step closer, helplessly reaching. "Please. I just…I need…" He put his hands on Steve's shoulders.

Steve sucked in a gasp, but he nodded.

He let Bucky turn him around and run his palms over his back. There were no scars, no marks of anything Bucky had done. His skin was so warm it was almost hot, but that might've just been because Bucky was freezing.

Steve looked over his shoulder. "I'm fine, Buck," he said softly. "You didn't hurt me. It was just a dream."

"I did hurt you," Bucky said, just as quiet. He wrapped his arms around Steve's chest, hugging him from behind. He could feel Steve's ribs expand with another gasp, the way his heart leaped beneath his ribs. Instantly Bucky's own stupid heart sped up in fear.

Bucky squeezed his eyes shut, fiercely reminding himself that Steve was alive and fine. He was fine. Alive. _Fine._ "All I do is hurt you."

Steve put his arms over Bucky's, threading their fingers together. "Not physically," he said. Bucky's cheek was against his jaw. When he spoke, Steve's words rumbled through his skin. Bucky could feel him swallow. "But this, what you've been doing…shutting me out…that hurts. That hurts like hell, Bucky. Why won't you talk to me?"

Bucky smirked darkly. "Believe me, you don't wanna hear about the cesspit in my head."

Steve sighed. "I do. I do want to know. You can tell me anything." He lifted a hand to cup the back of Bucky's neck, caressing the damp hair at his nape. "You can't just keep it all inside you like this."

Bucky dropped his forehead onto Steve's shoulder. "I'd rather beat you to death."

Steve let him go.

"No, no, wait!" Bucky held him more tightly, then realized what he was doing and the blast of terror made him let go like Steve was on fire. He forced himself to at least put his hand on Steve's arm. The muscles were rock-solid with tension. "I didn't mean it like that. I meant that what I did…." Bucky clenched his jaw. "I will never forgive myself for what I did to you." It was a strange sort of relief to say it out loud, the honesty hanging like gallows between them. "But it was still kinder than it'd be to tell you about all the other things I've done."

Steve turned around. "Kinder for who? Kinder for _who,_ Bucky? You just said you'd never forgive yourself for what you've done—how is that kinder than talking to me? I've never blamed you. Not for any of it. It wasn't you. It _wasn't you._ " He reached to cup Bucky's face, but Bucky flinched back. Steve dropped his hand. "You've got all this blame inside of you when you didn't do anything. But you won't talk to anyone. You'll never get better if you don't."

"I don't deserve to get better." The words shot out of his mouth before he knew he'd say them.

"What?" Steve's eyes were huge. "No! No! Oh my God, Bucky. How could you say that?"

Bucky shrugged, but he couldn't meet Steve's eyes. "Just opened my mouth and said it. It's true, anyhow."

" _It's not true,_ " Steve snarled. He turned his arm to break Bucky's grip, then took his wrist instead. It was a combat technique, like they were going to fight. "What you don't deserve is to treat yourself like this. You don't deserve to keep thinking of yourself as somehow complicit in what happened to you. You _don't deserve_ to keep refusing help like you're unworthy of it!"

"Please, Bucky." Steve closed his eyes, then scraped his fingers through his hair and left his hand cupping the back of his neck. When he lifted his head his eyes were luminous and sad. "I swear, sometimes I miss you more than I did when I thought you were dead."

That hurt. Another hit he'd earned along with all the rest of them. "I'm right here."

Steve shook his head. "That's the thing. You're not. You know this is the first time you've touched me of your own volition in weeks? You don't touch me, you barely talk to me, we've barely seen each other in a week, since you ran out of the gym…." He looked stricken. "Why are you doing this? What did I do wrong?"

"Nothing!" Bucky said immediately. "No. Swear to God, Stevie, you didn't do anything. You didn't do anything wrong."

"Then _why?_ " Steve demanded. "What the hell is this for? God damn it, Bucky, I love you! I love you. You're—you were my Dom. You're.…" He broke off, teeth gritted. "And now you don't touch me. You don't talk to me and you don't even touch me. It's like we're not even friends."

"We are!" Bucky burst out. "Jesus Christ, Stevie—of course we are! We're friends. That ain't gonna change."

"Then why don't you want me anymore?"

Bucky clenched his jaw, swallowing around the ache. "I do want you. I want you so much, Steve. But I can't. The Red Room and Hydra…they took.…" he cut himself off, shaking his head. "I hurt subs. I can't be your Dom."

"What did they do to you, Bucky?" Steve's voice was soft now, pleading. "What did they do to you to make you think you could ever hurt me? Can you please tell me? You keep saying you hurt subs. What did Hydra make you do?"

"Please. Don't ask me," Bucky stepped back, heart thundering. "Don't make me tell you. Please. They're dead. They're all dead."

"Who are dead?" Steve said, then his eyes widened in horrible comprehension. "You mean, the other subs?"

"It doesn't matter," Bucky said. "It doesn't matter what happened. I can't be your Dom, Steve. I don't deserve you."

"Yes you do," Steve ground out. "You are my Dom and you deserve me. I'm _yours_." He set his jaw and dropped to his knees.

The sudden bolt of terror that seized Bucky eclipsed everything. The world went white.

He came to on the bed with Steve holding him, softly reminding him over and over again that everything was all right; it was 2014; Bucky was in Avengers Tower and he was safe, he was safe….

"Let go of me!" Bucky thrashed his way out of Steve's arms, scrambled off the other side of the bed and ended up standing with his back against the wall like he was expecting an ambush. He shook with fear, barely able to think through the sheer animal panic. "Get out." He had to remember how to say it in English. "Get out. Get out. Get out."

Steve's eyes were huge with guilt and concern. "I'm sorry! God, Bucky. I didn't mean…I'm so sorry!" He came closer, slowly rounding the bed. "Please, let me help you."

"No." Bucky turned his head away, squeezing his eyes shut. "Don't. Don't. You can't help me." At least it was in the right language. "Not your fault. Just go. Please. Get out."

He waited until Steve was gone before he allowed himself to slide down to sit heavily on the floor, hugging himself like a child.

 _Idiot. Idiot. Idiot_. He should never have touched Steve, never let him start yet another useless argument. He should have known Steve would kneel for him and stopped it.

Steve was _everything._ And nothing Bucky could have anymore. And the instant Steve dropped like that, all Bucky could think of was the gun.

* * *

Natasha answered the door in pajamas but perfectly alert. J.A.R.V.I.S. had told her that Steve Rogers was waiting outside and asking for her. She wished for a moment that Clint was with her, but he hadn't been tired so he'd gone elsewhere to read. And she was glad for that, really. If Steve needed her in the middle of the night, it couldn't be for anything good. At least Clint could stay out of it.

Steve was in pajamas too: a simple set of black, drawstring pants and a white tee-shirt she was sure he'd pulled on for propriety's sake. His bedhead was adorable, but he looked so devastated it was very, very easy not to smile.

He was standing like a soldier with his hands behind his back when she opened the door. But that only made the wreckage inside him more obvious. He was holding such pain in that quiet, stoic way of his that she was certain whatever had happened to him was far worse than what she could see.

"Did James hurt you?" she said.

"No," Steve said immediately and Natasha relaxed a little. "No. He just…he…" He trailed off, swallowing, and then wordlessly handed her a sheathed knife.

Natasha had been far too well trained to do anything but take and hold it, though she wanted to throw it across the room. "No," she said with perfect calm and handed it back to him. "I don't use knives. Not for scenes. I was trained to use knives to torture or to kill. I can't…." She set her jaw. "I won't use them on anyone I care about. I'm sorry," she added, softer, when she saw how Steve tried to hide his disappointment. She put her hand on his arm. "I will do anything else within reason. But not knives."

Steve nodded slowly. "All right," he said on a soft sigh. "I need…" He turned the full force of his miserable eyes on her. "Can you hurt me? Please?" He knelt, bowing his head in such sweet, lovely supplication that her heart broke for him: that anyone could reject such a submissive as this.

She stepped forward so his forehead rested against her abdomen, and she ran her fingers through his hair. "If I do this, I need to know that you'll obey me, Steven. I won't fight you for your submission. I don't play those games."

He exhaled another sigh. "I promise I won't fight you, ma'am."

"Excellent." Natasha didn't let on how relieved she was. She hadn't wanted to refuse him. "Then yes, Steve. I promise I'll hurt you."

* * *

"Clint."

"Hey, Bucky." This was the first time Bucky had found him on purpose, but Clint's grin vanished as soon as he looked up from his Starktab and saw Bucky's face. "What's wrong?"

Bucky stood in front of the couch like an animal about to bolt. He had his arms crossed, but Clint was sure that was to hide his trembling. Bucky's face was pale with fear.

Clint put the tablet on the cushion beside him and stood up, a little awkwardly with his walking cast. He was sure to make his movements deliberate and slow. "You look like hell. What happened? Is it Steve?"

"Yes." Bucky swallowed, then shook his head. "No." He scraped the fingers of both his hands through his hair, then left them on the back of his neck. "I fucked up, Clint. I fucked up so bad." His eyes looked like storms. "I don't know what to do."

"Is Steve all right?" Clint went closer, keeping his voice even despite how his heart convulsed behind his ribs. He could so easily imagine Bucky hurting Steve during a nightmare, or a scene gone wrong, or any one of at least a hundred gruesome scenarios where Captain America was dead and Bucky irretrievable. "Bucky, please. Tell me what happened."

For one terrible, frozen moment Bucky stared at him like he couldn't remember, but then he shook his head and Clint's heart dropped out of his throat. "I didn't hurt him." It sounded like Bucky had to remind himself of that. "I had a nightmare, and he came to help me. And we argued. And he…" Bucky took a couple of deep, trembling breaths. "He went to his knees. Like Gri—like a sub. And…and I couldn't…."

"He's okay, though. You didn't do anything." It wasn't a question because Clint couldn't bear to make it one.

Bucky just shook his head distantly. "You do not dominate, little soldier," he murmured. He'd lapsed into Russian again.

"Bucky, you gotta speak English for me, bro. I'm really not awesome with Russian."

Bucky blinked at him. His eyes were still too wide, wild like a trapped animal's. "I don't remember what happened," he said. At least he was speaking English again. "I didn't hurt him." He kept clenching and unclenching his left hand; Clint wasn't sure he knew he was doing it. "But…but I can't…I—that's why I'm not with Steve," he managed finally. "I hurt subs." 

"You just said you didn't hurt him."

"Not last night." Bucky made it sound like last night was the exception. His left hand was still opening and closing like a reflex. "You don't understand. You keep treating me, like I'm not.... Like I'm some regular guy. But I'm not. I'm...." He shook his head. "There's something broken in me. You can't fix it."

"I'm not trying to fix you. I'm broken too." Clint had rounded the coffee table, close enough to Bucky now that he had to tilt his head up to look at his face. "But I want to help. That's why you found me, right? 'Cause I want to help."

Bucky backed up a step. "I don't think you can help me."

"Let me try." Clint took a step closer. "What do you need?" he asked, because Bucky always said that.

Bucky was still breathing too fast, but his expression hardened and he gritted his teeth like he was preparing for a fight. "Kneel."

The command was delivered beautifully, no hint of anxiety or hesitation. It sent a delicious shiver down Clint's spine and he would've dropped right there if he hadn't seen how terrified Bucky was and how hard he was working now to hide it. "Are you sure?"

Bucky looked pretty much anything except sure, but he nodded. "Wait," he rasped, then quickly snatched up the nearest cushion and put it on the floor by Clint's feet. "For your ankle."

"Thanks." That would help keep his foot in a more comfortable position, since he couldn't really turn his leg like this. Clint hadn't thought of it, but he wasn't surprised the Dom had.

He slowly lowered himself to his knees on the cushion, keeping his eyes on Bucky. Bucky sucked in a breath like he'd been gut-punched, then backed up another step like he was about to bolt. 

"It's okay. You're safe." Clint kept his head up but stayed on his knees. He didn't know if he was doing the right thing, but he didn't know what the right thing _was_ , and he was doing what Bucky had told him. "You're safe. No one's gonna hurt you."

"I'll hurt you," Bucky said, breathless with fear.

"I trust you," Clint said simply. "I know you won't hurt me." He put his arms behind his back and bowed his head, forcing himself to relax, submit. "Touch me, please."

"I can't," Bucky whispered. "I can't. You…you don't know…."

"You're right. I don't know what happened to you. But I know you won't hurt me. I _know_ it, Bucky. I live here in the tower with you. I trust you with my life. I trust you with my _Domme's_ life. And I know you won't hurt me." He leaned forward just slightly. "Touch me, Bucky. It'll be fine."

"It won't." Bucky sounded near tears, but he took a step closer.

Clint could see him out of the corner of his eye: Bucky's right hand moving almost as if it was out of his control. Clint stayed as still as he ever had as a sniper, barely daring to breathe. He could hear Bucky's too-rapid breathing, then feel Bucky's hand shaking when his fingers touched Clint's hair.

Clint wanted to say something, give Bucky more encouragement, but he could feel how precarious this moment was. He bit the inside of his cheek instead and didn't move.

Bucky's breath hitched, and then he started carding his fingers through Clint's hair. Still tentative, but soft and sweet. Clint couldn't help leaning into the touch.

Bucky whipped his hand back. "Stop," he said. His voice sounded like gravel, and when Clint lifted his head Bucky looked wrecked. "Get up. Please, get up now."

Clint stood up immediately. Bucky's hands were still shaking, and his eyes were huge and liquid against the grey of his skin. 

"Thank you," Clint said.

Bucky swallowed. "I didn't hurt you, right? That…I didn't hurt you?"

"No." Clint shook his head, reminding himself fiercely to stay still, not to kneel again or try to touch, no matter how much Bucky looked like he needed it. "You didn't hurt me at all. It felt good. I liked it."

Bucky opened his fists and looked down at his hands. He murmured something in Russian that Clint didn't entirely catch but had something to do with blood and guns. Bucky let out a sob that sounded like it tore him in half, then put his right hand over his eyes, going silent as he cried.

Clint kicked the cushion aside and hugged him.

Bucky stiffened in alarm, but then he wrapped his left arm around Clint's back. He grabbed a fistful of the back of Clint's tee-shirt as he leaned into his embrace. The cloth ripped, but Clint didn't care.

"It's okay, Bucky. I'm fine. You didn't hurt me." He repeated the words over and over, in English and Russian, hoping Bucky could hear him, and hoping even more that he'd listen.

Mostly he just held on, trying to anchor Bucky through his grief. Bucky let him, which maybe meant nothing, but right then felt like a hell of a lot.

* * *

The muscles in Steve's back were as tight as violin strings. His body made one tense, perfect line from his raised arms to his toes that barely touched the floor. The restraints holding him had been made specifically for super soldiers, otherwise he would've broken them or pulled them out of the wall. At least one good thing had come out of Hydra's controlling Bucky then trying to capture Steve too.

Natasha had rubbed pepper oil on his back before she'd started whipping him. The oil would hurt even if she didn't touch him, but each whiplash drove the oil in, setting his broken skin on fire. She knew it hurt.

But it wasn't enough. She wasn't going to be able to break him. She could read it in the tension of his muscles, his sweat, his gasping breath every time the whip came down. She'd brought him close, but not close enough. He was too strong, and some of the wounds she'd made were already healing.

To actually take him down, Natasha would either have to whip him for hours—and even her own enhanced endurance would give out long before that—or she'd have to cause damage far beyond what she was willing to do.

Steve had handed her a knife; she was sure he'd welcome her flaying him alive. But she'd spent too much of her life with her instincts as a Domme twisted to cause torture and pain. She couldn't make herself do that anymore, even for a sub who all but begged her for it.

She'd miscalculated, badly. Natasha recognized that even as she hit him again. When she'd agreed to Clint's plan, she'd been thinking of Bruce. Sometimes, when his guilt overwhelmed him, Bruce wanted pain far beyond Pepper's skills to give. But the whip and the oil worked beautifully on him. Natasha had thought she could use them on Steve as well. But she hadn't considered the vital difference: Bruce could turn into the Hulk, but otherwise he was human. Ordinary. Steve wasn't. 

She brought the whip down hard, channeling her anger at herself into the blow. She deliberately crossed two welts she'd made earlier, mouth twitching in grim satisfaction as Steve's back arched, and he wasn't able to hold in the cry.

She hit him on the opposite side, again making sure the lash landed on skin that was already broken, then a third time and a fourth. He shuddered in the restraints, breathing hard, head bowed, and for one moment she thought that maybe she'd done it despite everything. But then the tension rolled back over him like a wave.

"Red." His voice was ragged but clear.

"We're done." She kept her own voice kind but businesslike, hiding her disappointment. She knew damn well he hadn't needed to safeword. She put her equipment on a table to be cleaned later, then gathered the cushions, blankets and water she'd set out, as well as washcloths and towels. She used those to clean up the sweat dripping down his abused back and his face, going up on her toes to reach him.

"I'm releasing you now." She took the remote for the cuffs and stood near in case he needed help, but Steve just winced a little as he rolled his shoulders. 

Natasha hid her sigh as she went back to the table. "I'll put some antiseptic cream on your back, let me know if you start to get cold." 

"No, thank you. I'm fine. I heal quickly."

"I know you'll heal," she said, also hiding her irritation. She wasn't annoyed with him. "The cream will make certain it heals properly."

Steve nodded. He sighed. "Do whatever you want."

That stung, despite how she knew he wasn't trying to wound. She made sure to smile. "Oh, I will." She gently spread the cream over the welts, then covered them in gauze and taped it down. She could feel Steve's urge to flee in every twitch of his back, but she ignored it. "Sit."

He did, cross-legged on one of the cushions. He neatly folded his hands in his lap, looking so quietly dejected it was heartbreaking. "What kind of Gatorade do you want? I have orange, strawberry and some flavor Clint just calls 'Blue'."

"May I just have some water, please? I really don't like how Gatorade tastes."

His tractability was almost cloying. She'd had no idea how much that constant hint of rebellion defined him until she was suddenly faced with its absence. She regretted forcing his compliance now. "Yes, if you eat something with it."

"I appreciate what you're trying to do, ma'am," Steve said, an unreleased sigh behind the words. "But I don't need anything. I'm fine."

" _I_ need you to let me take care of you, for me," she answered briskly. "Letting someone who's in the shape you're in just leave won't sit well, no matter how quickly you heal. Aftercare is as much for the Domme as it is for the sub." Phrasing it that way was manipulative, but it was also true.

Steve dropped his head to his chest. "All right."

"I know this is hard for you." She stroked the back of his head. "I appreciate and honor your submission."

He just nodded.

Natasha suppressed a sigh of her own as she went to the kitchen. She returned with two glasses of water, fruit that Clint had prepared earlier and salty crackers with slices of cheese. She crouched next to Steve and brought one of the glasses to his mouth, tilting it just enough so the liquid reached his lips. 

She did this with Clint all the time, and he loved it. But Steve turned his head away. A tremor rocked his shoulders. "I'm sorry," he said quickly. "I'm not refusing. I just.... Could I feed myself, please?"

She put the glass down immediately "Of course." He was already miserable; the last thing she wanted was to make him feel worse. She wondered if Bucky had been the only one who ever hand-fed him. 

"Thank you," he said softly. He picked up the glass and took a sip, then reached behind him and tugged the ottoman over. 

She accepted the offering for the recompense it was, and sat on it to eat from her own plate. 

Steve ate and drank exactly what she'd given him, then clasped his hands in his lap again. "Thank you. May I leave?"

Natasha took a bite of apple so she wouldn't wince. Steve sounded far more like a chastised schoolboy than a sub who'd just finished a scene. "I wish you'd let me give you more than this. I'd really prefer it if you'd stay, let me make certain you're truly all right before you go. I'm not ordering," she added when his face fell. "But I am asking, as a friend."

"Thank you," he said again, unfailingly polite. "But I really am all right." He stood. "If I weren't, we would've both known it by now."

"May I have your word that you'll call me, if something does happen?" she asked. "Clint will worry, otherwise."

Steve managed something approaching a smirk. "I'd hate to worry _Clint._ I promise I'll call or ask J.A.R.V.I.S. to."

Natasha gave him a smile in return. "Clint is going to give me a very polite and very thorough interrogation when he gets back. And if he doesn't think I did enough, he will worry."

"Noted," Steve said. "But he doesn't have to."

Natasha shook her head. "You don't know Clint, then."

"Apparently not." It sounded like Steve was speaking by rote, barely paying attention to the conversation. He picked up his plate and glass along with hers, then brought them into the kitchen. Acting the good sub to the hilt.

She hated it, but that had been ostensibly what she'd wanted so she just thanked him and waited for him to come back. When he bent to pick up his shirt it was miserably obvious he was in pain but devoted to not showing it. She gritted her teeth.

"Let me help you."

"I..." He sighed out loud for the first time, finally showing some of the insolence that Bucky apparently loved. Now Natasha understood why. "Fine." He handed her his shirt.

She frowned up at him. "As a friend."

He nodded, but didn't lose the tight resignation in his expression.

"Kneel down, you're too tall."

A host of emotions crossed his face, most of them unpleasant. He knelt, moving stiffly in a way she knew had nothing to do with pain. She could practically feel his tension like the heat radiating from his wounds. 

She put the shirt on quickly and efficiently, consciously keeping her touch impersonal and reining in her instincts as a Domme. This wasn't about her dynamic; it was about helping a friend. She didn't have enough of those to hurt any of them. 

He got up the moment she finished. "Thank you. And thank you for the…." His mouth twitched unhappily. "For trying."

"We're friends, Steve," she said simply. "We help each other."

He gave her a tiny nod and a smile that barely flickered over his lips. "I know."

She showed him out, shut the door behind him, and then indulged herself by leaning against it and letting out every sigh she'd kept silent during the scene and after.

"Well, that went terribly," she murmured. Clint would be so disappointed.

Just like she was.

* * *

Steve came slowly out of the elevator on the floor he shared with Bucky. He hurt: the stripes girding his torso still burned with the pepper oil, and his whole body was sore from the position Nat had forced him into with the cuffs. It wasn't enough.

The worst part was that he'd been so close. He'd come _so close_ to slipping over that perfect, razor edge and being able to lose himself in the pain. But Natasha hadn't wanted to hurt him as much as he'd asked for. In the end he'd just safeworded, because he could tell she was getting tired and it wasn't working anyway.

He was honest enough to admit he was angry, as well as disappointed. He'd told Natasha he'd wanted her to hurt him, and she had to know by now how quickly he healed. But apparently she hadn't trusted his judgement about his own body. She'd offered to take him down if he needed it, but now a small, petulant part of him couldn't help thinking that she must not have meant it.

He knew that wasn't fair.

Truth was, Steve hadn't really expected anything, and maybe he'd doomed the scene before they'd even started because of it. But Nat wasn't Bucky, and Bucky was the only Dom Steve had ever wanted to settle him. Bucky was the only Dom who ever had; even Peggy had never taken Steve down on her own.

He stopped outside the door to Bucky's room. It was closed, of course. He kept telling Steve he loved him, but this didn't feel like love. This felt like Bucky didn't want anything to do with him anymore. That hurt so much sometimes Steve wished he'd never found him. Not that Bucky had never escaped from Hydra, just that Steve and Sam had never brought him home.

Maybe Bucky would've been happier if he'd never come back. Maybe it was just as terrible for him, having to spend every spare minute in the same building as the sub he didn't want.

Steve's hands tightened into fists, his muscles bunching in anger no matter how he told himself that Bucky had the right to make his own choices; that Bucky owed Steve nothing and that Steve had no claim on him; that Bucky hadn't even been _himself_ for all that long. But Steve was hurt and bleeding and it still wasn't _enough_ , and the wounds were already healing and he was _so sick and tired_ of this: standing outside Bucky's door, wishing he'd have a nightmare so Steve would have an excuse to go to him. Wishing Bucky would call his name.

Bucky didn't.

Steve locked the bathroom door then shucked his clothes and yanked off Natasha's bandages. Most of the lash marks had already healed. Some might take until morning, but he'd had far worse. He wadded up the tape and gauze and threw it into the waste basket. Part of him, guilty and ashamed, wanted to hide the evidence of the scene. Another part hoped Bucky saw it and asked him what happened, but his imagination failed at how Bucky would react. Would he be angry? Sickened? Disappointed? Would he even care?

He'd probably care. Bucky had sure as hell cared after Azzano: Steve could remember the revulsion on his face, once he'd seen how much Steve had enjoyed Bucky's belting him. Bucky never could stand the idea of Steve being hurt.

The knife was still carefully sheathed in its hiding spot, exactly where Steve had left it when Natasha summoned him for the scene. Steve unsheathed it, then took it into the shower with him. He'd kept his promise to Dr. Simmons and gone to another Domme, but that didn't make him any less queasy with guilt and self-disgust at what he was about to do.

Maybe part of Steve wanted Bucky to find out about Natasha's scene, but imagining Bucky finding out about _this_ made Steve want to throw up the food she'd obliged him to eat. All the same, that didn't stop him tracing the first red line on the inside of his arm.

It was easy, after that. Steve was very, very careful not to cut too deeply. He'd rather slit his throat then have to admit to Simmons or Bruce that he'd done this again. That meant the lacerations had to be shallow, so he compensated by making more of them. More and more and more until he was dripping red from his collarbones to his feet; until the combination of pain and release made him lightheaded and he had to sit on the floor and put his head between his red-streaked knees. He reached up to turn the shower on.

 _It tends to escalate quickly_ , Simmons had told him. He panted under the shower spray and wondered idly if she'd be impressed with how violently he'd proved her right.

* * *

"J.A.R.V.I.S. said you wanted me?" Bucky said as he trotted out of the elevator. He took a quick glance around the common room like he was looking for an ambush. Or maybe Steve. His keen eyes swept the coffee table and Clint caught the momentary flash of disappointment when Bucky didn't see any more physics books. "What do you need?"

"Nothing." Clint switched on his most charming grin. "I just wanted you to hear something. I figured you'd get a kick out of it."

"Oh yeah?" Bucky looked a little suspicious, but mostly intrigued. He'd even smiled a bit, which for Bucky was about a hundred percent more relaxed than the first, oh, billion times Clint had interacted with him. "What?"

Clint grinned. "Hit it, J," he said. Instantly the room was filled with [the remix of 'Puttin' on the Ritz'](https://youtu.be/XmFObdnTBAg) Clint had stumbled on by accident when he was trying to find music he figured Bucky would recognize that didn't all come from the Swing Kids movie soundtrack. He had no idea what Bucky thought of modern music, but Clint hoped he'd find the remix interesting, at the very least.

Bucky blinked when the song came on, then tilted his head and squinted his eyes as he listened. He was concentrating so hard that Clint could practically hear his brain thrumming beneath the accelerated beat.

"I know this," he said at last, sounding surprised. "But, the lyrics were different."

"Yeah," Clint said quickly. "This is remixing a cover from the 1980s, using the lyrics from, um, 1946. I think."

Bucky nodded slowly, still listening. "The song I heard was about Harlem."

"Yeah, I listened to that one." Clint grimaced. "[It was kind of racist](https://youtu.be/66km3m_UE_k). I like this version better."

"I like this one too. It's good." Bucky was moving to the beat, nodding his head and tapping one foot. He squinted again, then bit his lip, then did a couple of small, tentative dance steps that Clint thought might work with a waltz. "No," Bucky murmured. "That's not…" He tried again, this time rocking back on his left foot before putting weight on his right, then adding a simple side-to-side pattern. "Oh yeah." He sped up until he matched the beat of the music. Then he added little elaborations like kicks and turns.

He was really good, which given his history wasn't surprising. But what knocked Clint's breath out of him for a second was that Bucky was _smiling_ : a full-blown, dazzlingly bright grin that transformed Bucky's face from his usual beauty to something incandescent.

Bucky spun to face Clint and held out his hand, still grinning. "Wanna dance?" And there was no way in hell Clint was going to refuse that, even if he was still stumping around in a walking cast. He'd always been good at improvising.

Luckily, Clint knew how to dance too, though the steps he'd learned for some of the more glamorous undercover ops were a bit more sedate than Bucky's. But Clint was nothing if not graceful and quick on his feet, and even with a cast, if he couldn't match Bucky's more complicated steps he could definitely keep up.

He didn't notice when the song changed because the beat was the same and he was concentrating on following Bucky's lead. Clint had danced with Natasha plenty of times, but it was a nice change, dancing with someone who was taller and stronger than he was for once. And when Bucky said, "'Know any airsteps?" with that same bright grin, Clint laughed.

"Bring it."

Bucky's grin turned wolfish, because he would never not be a bit of an asshole. But Clint just rolled his eyes and said, "If you drop me, Nat'll kill you."

Bucky laughed too. Then, ["Around the back."](https://youtu.be/h9s05OCKfFs) Clint obediently pulled away so they were at arm's length, then let Bucky snap him close so Bucky could use his left arm to swing Clint up and around over his head like a coat before guiding him back to his feet, careful of his walking cast. Clint was sure Bucky could've easily thrown him across the room; he wondered how much Bucky had to hold back to keep within Clint's human limitations. It was still pretty awesome, being tossed like he weighed less than Natasha.

Bucky kept grinning, delighted. ["Flail,"](https://youtu.be/etGP2rjsqIw?t=6m) he said, then whipped Clint up almost before he could remember what the hell that meant. Clint managed the move without hoofing Bucky in the balls though, and when Bucky swung Clint's legs up he didn't break Clint's back either, so Clint called it a win.

Then, "["Slingshot!"](https://youtu.be/J7QoNRFqYqk?t=3m57s) Bucky scooped Clint up and Clint gleefully threw himself into a circle around Bucky's arm.

"Your turn," Clint countered, and yeah: Bucky was a hell of a lot heavier than Natasha, but that didn't mean Clint had a problem with flipping him.

"[Fly](https://youtu.be/E1A1cvmcsl4?t=1m13s)," Bucky said immediately. He was laughing again—they both were—and Bucky's eyes were shining like Clint figured they hadn't since before the war. When Bucky swung Clint up over his head that time, Clint almost touched the floor's cathedral-like ceiling.

He landed light and steady on his feet and whirled into a spin when Bucky let go of him. Only to nearly sprain something when he saw Steve and stopped himself dead.

"J," Bucky said, and the A.I. killed the music. Bucky was a little flushed from effort, but he wasn't laughing or even smiling anymore. He'd gone completely still, his expression shut as a slammed door.

"Um. Hi," Clint said to Steve.

"Hi." Steve's face reminded Clint of when they'd first met, right after Natasha broke Loki's hold on him. Steve looked like this wasn't a conversation but a war, and one he expected to lose. "I heard music. What are you doing?"

Clint swallowed. Every instinct he had was to drop to his knees and beg Steve's forgiveness for two-timing him with Bucky, no matter how he knew he hadn't done anything wrong. "I, um. Asked him."

Steve blinked at Clint. "To dance?"

"It wasn't like that," Bucky said, because he was a good Dom and had probably picked up exactly what Clint was feeling. "We just...." He shrugged. "He wanted me to listen to some music. I asked him to dance. It wasn't anything."

A muscle in Steve's jaw tightened, but then he broke into a bitter little smile. "So, you asked him to dance, huh?" Maybe Clint imagined the slight emphasis on _him_ , but he doubted it.

Bucky lifted his chin and crossed his arms. It did nothing to hide his guilty expression. "Yeah. I did."

Clint looked between Steve and Bucky, from Bucky's protective defiance to Steve's stony misery. "Should I leave?"

"Naw," Bucky said, his eyes still on Steve. "That's fine. I was just going anyway." His smile when he looked at Clint was wistful and sad, nothing like the dazzling exuberance of just a few minutes before. "'Night, Clint. Thanks for the dance."

Clint gave him a small smile in return. "Hey, thanks for throwing me around. Nat's tried, but she's not...." He was going to say, _she's not strong enough,_ but it felt wrong to say that in front of Steve, when Bucky was more than strong enough to lift him, too.

Bucky nodded like he understood anyway. "Goodnight," he said. He gave a tiny, tragic smile to Steve before he turned to go.

"Bucky?" Steve said.

Bucky swung around, his expression one of wary hope. "Yeah?"

Steve's expression was just heartbreaking. "Why didn't…." He trailed off and just gave Bucky a thin, bitter smile. "Never mind. Goodnight."

Bucky looked like he wanted to say something, but he hesitated and then clearly decided against it. He just nodded again and went through the doorway to the stairs.

Steve ducked his head and ran his fingers through his hair. "Son of a bitch," he muttered, though Clint didn't know if he meant Bucky or just the situation in general.

"It's not what it looks like," Clint said.

"It didn't look like anything, Clint," Steve said wearily. "I don't have a claim on him anyway."

"You do," Clint said. "Or, you would, if he'd just…relax."

A miserable laugh burst out of Steve's mouth. He put his hands on his hips, looking at the empty space where Bucky had been. He let out a long breath. God, he sounded so tired. Clint's heart ached for him. "I appreciate what you're trying to do, Clint. Really. But I think...I think he's been pretty clear about what he wants." He looked down at the floor, his voice dropping." And it's not me."

"I really think you're wrong there," Clint said. "He's still got it strong for you. He talks about you all the time."

Steve shook his head, and his smile was a lot more like a wince of pain. "No offence, Clint, but you're wrong." He glanced back at the stairwell doors where Bucky had fled. "But I thought that at least he'd...." He shook his head. "It doesn't matter."

"You want to, um, get a beer or something?" Clint asked, because he hated how sad Steve looked. He'd been trying to make things _better_ between them, damn it, but it seemed he'd only made it worse.

"No, thank you. It's kind of you to offer, but it's late, and beer doesn't do much for me nowadays anyway," Steve said it in that freakishly polite way that meant a regular person would probably be punching the wall. Steve even smiled again, though it was so freaking sad Clint wouldn't've minded punching the wall himself.

"Sure." Clint nodded quickly, not even feeling bad that part of him was just as happy to be able to flee like Bucky had. "I'll get going, then." He started towards the elevator, but stopped, turning back to Steve. "I was going to back off when he came to his senses. About you, I mean."

"Don't do that," Steve said. "I mean, he's happy with you. Don't take that from him just for me. It's not fair to either of you."

"That's the thing. He's not happy. He's this big fucking ball of misery and self-loathing. I've just been…trying to make him a little less of one. But the idea was to get him back to you."

"Oh." Steve blinked. "Well, that…that's kind. His smile was more genuine now, if still just as sad. "Thank you. Thanks for taking care of him. He needs it so badly. And I've tried, but…." His smile slipped, and when he yanked it up again it was crooked and entirely wrong on his expressive face. "I'm glad he has you."

Clint shrugged. It felt awful to be praised for something he'd fucked up so badly. "Thanks. But, I've just been trying to treat him the way you would, you know? Until he lets you do it."

"He won't," Steve said with heartbreaking certainty. He lifted his hand. "Goodnight, Clint."

"G'night."

Clint took the elevator up to the roof, to a favored spot where he was protected from the wind on two sides and could lean on a railing to look out on Manhattan. It was beautiful tonight, but couldn't help soothe him. He called Laura, hoping that the time difference would mean he didn't wake her up. 

"Clint, it's 11:30," she said, crushing that hope. "Everything okay?"

"Think I bit off more than I can chew with Bucky."

He could hear her sitting up. "Are you all right?"

Clint sighed. "I'm pretty sure I made Captain America cry. That's like, I'm going to hell for that, aren't I?"

"Oh, honey. I think they make a special hell for people who do that. What happened?"

"It seemed like a good idea at the time…."

"What did? Clint, please. It's late and I'm tired and I need you to focus and tell me the whole story from beginning to end." Clint could picture her sitting up against the headboard of their bed, one hand rubbing at her forehead. "Everything. Not just tidbits. I can't read your mind, remember? Especially not over the phone."

"Yes, mistress. I'm sorry." He took a deep breath like she'd taught him, and gathered his thoughts. "I played some music for Bucky, a remake of a song from the '30's, and he started dancing to it. And then he asked me to join in."

"Sounds like fun."

"It was great! He smiled and even laughed."

"Wow!" He knew she was genuinely pleased for him; Clint had told her about the rarity of Bucky's smiles.

"And then Steve walked in." 

"Oh dear. And then what?"

"And then Bucky left. And Steve was really sad." Clint let his temple thunk against the concrete beside him. "Does he think you and Bucky are cheating on him?"

"I kept telling him that Bucky's into him, and that I'd step back once Bucky came to his senses," Clint said quickly. "So, no. I don't think so. Probably not." He sighed in relief.

"That's good," Laura agreed. "But is Bucky actually into him?" 

"Steve hung the sun, as far as Bucky's concerned," Clint said. "I tried to tell Steve that."

"Did he believe you?"

"I don't know," Clint said miserably. "Maybe not. He didn't sound mad, just…really sad."

"Oh, sweetheart. You always want to fix everyone. But you can't. This is up to Bucky and Steve. And if Bucky's giving such mixed signals that Steve doesn't know what he wants, then I'm sure you could skywrite it with one of your Quinjets and he'd never believe it. You have such a big, beautiful heart, and I love you so much for it. But maybe it's time to let this one go. If Bucky isn't ready to deal with whatever he's feeling for Steve, no one can make him. Not even you."

"But, they're both so fu—so freakin' unhappy!" Clint moaned. "If they'd just get together…!" 

"I know, and it's tragic. Just what you've told me about it is tragic. But Bucky's not ready. I think you know what that's like," Laura added gently.

"Yeah. But, I hate watching them do this to each other." 

"I know." They were both quiet for a moment. "Do you want to come home for a while? You and Nat?"

"I don't think we can, not right now. But yeah. When we can."

Laura let out a sigh of her own. "I miss you both." 

"I miss you so much, mistress."

"I'm sorry I can't be with you. Is Nat there?"

He shook his head, even though she couldn't see him. "I can go get her for you."

"That's okay, hon. I meant for her to look after you tonight. Since I can't be there."

"Yeah, she's here." He stretched his feet out on the rooftop, wishing for a rock or a pinecone or something to throw. "So I need to tell her that I messed up, too."

"It doesn't sound like you messed up, Clint," Laura said seriously. "It sounds like you did the best you could. From what you told me, if you were able to make Bucky relax even that much...that's pretty amazing."

Clint smiled a bit at the memory. "You should see him dance."

"I'd love to." He could hear her smile.

"Maybe one day we can get everyone to the farm. Clear out the yard in front of the barn, put up some lights and speakers. It'd make a good dance floor."

"That sounds like a great idea," she said. Then, "Are you okay?"

Clint pulled at a string on his shirt and let it blow away in the wind. If there was a metaphor there, he didn't get it. "Yeah. Thanks for helping me to get my head on straight."

"My pleasure." Her usually gentle voice took on a hint of sternness. "You know this isn't your fault, right? Steve and Bucky are grown men who can make their own choices. Even if they're bad ones. You can't change that, and you shouldn't."

"I know, but—"

"You hate to see people you care about hurting. I know," she cut in. "But, they need to find their own way. You've done what you could for Bucky. The rest is up to him."

Clint took a deep breath. "Yes, mistress."

"Good boy." The praise in her voice warmed him. "Now, much as I hate to leave you, I really need to go to sleep. You know how early the kids have to get up for school." The sheets rustled. "I'll give them big hugs for you and Nat."

"Thank you. I'm sorry that I woke you up." 

"Don't be. If you need me, I'll be here." He heard the click of the bedside lamp turning off. "You're mine, sweetheart. That means it's okay to wake me up if you want to talk. Remember?"

"Yes, mistress." Clint had no idea what he'd done to deserve her as his second Domme, but he treasured her. "Thank you, mistress."

"You're welcome, Clint. Goodnight. I love you. Please give my love to Nat as well."

"I will. And I know she loves you back." 

"I do too." He heard the slither of the comforter being pulled up over the sheet. "All right, I really need to go. Take care, love."

"Goodnight." Clint sat on the roof and stared out at the lights long after Laura hung up.

* * *

Steve didn't bother coming in quietly, since he was sure Bucky would just be pretending to sleep again. But Bucky was on the couch with his Starktab on his lap, illuminating one of his fucking miserable history books. He wasn't reading it. His eyes were fastened on the nightscape of the city outside the window, though Steve was sure whatever he saw wasn't the view. "What are you doing?"

"Nothing. Thinking, I guess." Bucky flipped the tablet irritably onto the coffee table. "I don't know."

Steve put his hands on his hips. "Thinking about what?" He didn't like how belligerent he sounded, knew that'd normally get Bucky's back up.

This time, Bucky didn't seem to care. "I don't know," he said again. "Just thinking."

Steve gritted his teeth. "Right. Of course you're not going to tell me."

Bucky scrubbed his face with his hand. "Fine. I was thinking about how many things could've gone wrong, up there. How easy it would've been to hurt Clint. Or kill him."

Steve gaped at him. "What?" He let out a heavy breath and ran his fingers through his hair. "I don't understand you. I really don't. You seemed be having a pretty good time with Clint, just now. Where the hell did this crap about hurting him come in?" He scowled. "Or, was the problem when _I_ came in? One look at my ugly mug and everything goes to hell for you, huh?"

Bucky frowned at him. "What the hell are you talking about? It had nothing to do with you. I forgot, is all." He shrugged, misery in every shadowed line of his body. "I forgot. I let my guard down, and I forgot what I could do. What if I snapped? Or had a bad memory or something? What if I flubbed one of the throws, 'cause it's been half a century since I did them?" He looked at Steve, his grey eyes big and imploring as if he was really begging him for an answer. "What if I hurt him 'cause I wasn't even thinking about it?"

"Why do you keep doing this?" Steve demanded. "It's not letting your guard down to actually behave like a regular human being! You've never 'snapped'. I don't even know what the hell you're talking about. And you haven't had a flashback since—" He stopped, wincing. "Since I kneeled for you. But you didn't hurt me."

"I had a flashback before then," Bucky said. "I almost killed Clint."

" _What?_ " Steve sucked in a breath. "When? What happened? Oh my God, is he all right?"

Bucky looked away again. He shook his head. "It doesn't matter. I got triggered and we were both damn lucky I remembered where the hell I was before I got my hands on him. He broke his ankle trying to get away from me." He looked exhausted and sad in the sallow glow from the tablet screen. All Steve wanted in the entire world was to go to him.

He didn't, because Bucky wouldn't want him to.

"Are you all right?"

Bucky's laugh was an awful, strangled thing that died before it left his throat. "I'm sitting here in the dark because I can't even fucking dance with a sub without going nuts afterwards. So, no. I am not all right, Stevie. I'm a fucking mess." He looked up at Steve, his expression hopeless. "You can't even kneel for me." 

"I could," Steve said. His own throat was thick with a choking knot of sorrow and frustration. "I could if you'd do something about how you're feeling. But you don't. You won't even try. The Bucky I lo—" He stopped, jaw ticking. "The man I knew wouldn't've just given up like this. Not on us. Not on himself. But you...it's like you want to be this way."

"You think I _want_ this?" Bucky gaped, then his expression went as dark as the room. "You think I _like_ living like this? Not even able to…to _touch_ you? To touch anyone?"

"You can touch Clint. That seems to be just fine." Steve didn't like how he sounded: juvenile and sullen. But he couldn't help the hurt that still prickled at him from when he'd seen Bucky and Clint dancing together.

Bucky looked away. "That's different."

"How?" Steve demanded. "He's a sub! How is that different, Bucky? Other than you treating me like...like I'm fucking Hydra, and then go dancing with him? You said we were friends. I thought we at least had that. But you've pushed me so far aside it's like I don't even know you anymore."

"You don't," Bucky said simply. "You don't. You never did. I'm sorry."

"Fuck you." Steve said it with more resignation than heat. "Why did you come back, then?"

"You needed me to."

"I need you now!"

"I know," Bucky said softly. "I'm sorry. That's the one thing I can't give you."

"You don't give me anything," Steve said. "Damn it! You say you don't want to live like this, but if that's true, why are you sitting here brooding in the dark? It's like all you're doing is waiting to die!"

"I already died, remember? When you didn't grab me?" Steve did his best not to flinch at the casual knife blade in the words; they drew blood all the same. "Bucky died when he fell out of the train." He gestured at himself. "This is just the wreckage that's left."

"That's bullshit," Steve snapped. "That's bullshit and you know it. That's you taking the easy way out, and you've never been a coward." He crossed his arms. "You don't like living like this? Then do something about it. Talk to someone. Clint. Or someone at the Avengers Facility. Or Sam. Stop letting what happened to you destroy you."

Bucky shook his head. "That's not going to make any difference."

"Eventually, yeah. It will. But what you're doing.... Nothing's ever gonna change, Buck. Do you really want to spend the rest of your life scared every time you relax that something terrible will happen? Why are you still letting Hydra control you?"

Bucky flinched visibly. "Fuck you! I'm not doing that!"

"Yeah, you are. I can see it every damn day. Hydra chewed you up and spit you out and you _survived_ , Bucky. You survived. But you're living like you didn't. Like you still belong to them, not to you. And…." Steve stopped, swallowing. "And I don't think I can do this anymore. I think it's time one of us moved out."

Bucky went still. "What?"

"You heard me," Bucky wouldn't look at him now, so Steve kept his eyes on the night outside the window. "You don't want me here…. You don't want to be here. We…we're _not_ friends." He ignored Bucky's gasp. "Hell, right now I'd say we're barely acquaintances. So. If you won't stop torturing yourself, and you sure as hell won't let me help you...Maybe you'll have a better chance at actually being happy somewhere else. With someone else. But I can't take this anymore. I'm sorry." He meant it.

"Okay." Bucky stood up, still not meeting Steve's eyes. "I know I got no right to—"

"No, you really don't," Steve said. "Friends have rights with each other. And you've made it clear you don't want that from me." He regretted the words the instant they were out of his mouth. But he and Bucky had never pulled punches with each other.

Bucky only nodded mechanically anyway. "I'll be out by morning." He finally pulled his head up and looked Steve in the eye. "I know it doesn't matter, but I'm sorry. I never wanted to hurt you."

Steve couldn't help the ugly, wet laugh that bubbled out of his throat. "You did a damn fine job of it anyway. At least this time maybe I'll actually be able to get over you. God knows I never have before."

"I'm sorry, Steve," Bucky said.

"I know." Steve started walking away but halted, looking at Bucky over his shoulder. "I love you. I always have. I never stopped. I just wish that meant anything."

He kept going then, and this time he didn't look back.

* * *

The guest suite J.A.R.V.I.S. directed Bucky to was even more swanky than the one he shared—had shared—with Steve. It had the same anonymous glamour of the Manhattan hotels he and Steve had joked about spending the night in, before the war when they were lucky to make rent. Bucky felt out of place, standing in the middle of all that useless opulence.

Not that there was anywhere he felt right in, starting with his own skin.

He dropped his half empty duffel on the floor and sat down on the ridiculously plush leather couch with his hands clenched on his thighs, wondering why he was bothering to stay in the tower at all. He'd been almost glad when Steve finally kicked him out. It was about time the punk woke up and realized Bucky was no good for him. But now he was hurting so bad he kind of felt dead inside, like he'd been hollowed out.

He should leave for good. There was no reason to stay anymore. Never had been, really. He'd come back for Steve, because Steve had needed him. Bucky didn't know he'd been Steve's Dom then. He'd barely remembered Steve at all, hadn't even known his own name. But he'd known with a certainty that went down to his soul that he would do anything for him.

He wished he'd remembered enough then to know that the best thing he could've done for Steve was to just turn around and keep running.

"I should go," Bucky said. His voice echoed in the too-large room, painfully stark against his miserable silence. He could start hunting Hydra again, maybe hook up with whatever band of misfits Coulson was calling his team these days. Or just…disappear. He used to be really good at that. He still knew how. He still knew everything the Red Room and Hydra had beaten into him.

But that was the whole problem, wasn't it? He knew how to be a killer, and an assassin, and a spy. He didn't know how to be a Dom anymore. Hell, he barely knew how to be a person. At least Steve had figured that out before Bucky had hurt him.

But he hadn't hurt Clint.

"Dumb luck," Bucky said, and he believed it. But.

But Bucky didn't want to leave. It wasn't that he had nowhere to go. He was good with that. That'd been his whole life, once. It wasn't even that he still thought Steve might need him. He wasn't that naïve. Or stupid.

It was that he didn't want to go.

 _He didn't want to go._ And Steve had one thing pegged right: Bucky didn't want to keep living this half-life of not being a Dom, of barely even knowing who he was, anymore. He was so sick and tired of hurting inside all the time. He was so tired of being afraid.

Bucky had always been afraid. When they were kids, he'd been afraid of Steve getting sick and dying, then when they were older of not being able to make enough to look after him. Then he'd been terrified of leaving Steve behind when he had to go to war; of something awful happening when he wasn't there to protect him; of Steve finding another, better Dom who could look after him the way Bucky always wanted to but could never afford. A Dom who really deserved him.

And then, after Azzano, he'd been afraid of dying and leaving Steve alone. And then when Steve was the one who rescued him, Bucky had been afraid that Steve wouldn't need him anymore. And then he'd whipped Steve bloody instead of giving him what he needed, and Bucky had been afraid Steve would leave him. He'd been so grateful when Steve had asked Bucky to follow him into battle instead.

The Winter Soldier had been afraid all the time, but he'd learned to suppress it to survive. The Asset hadn't known there was anything else other than fear and pain.

He was James Buchanan Barnes, and he wasn't good enough for Steve and maybe he never had been, but he didn't want to leave him behind again. And Bucky was sick to the fucking teeth of being afraid.

Clint had flat-out told Bucky he wasn't asking for Bucky to top him in a scene. But he hadn't said he'd refuse if Bucky offered. And Bucky….

Bucky looked down at his fists, opening and closing convulsively on his thighs. His left hand reflected the light like a blade. He was terrified. But Clint had Natasha. She'd make sure Bucky didn't hurt him.

And maybe if he could be Clint's Dom, even just for a night…maybe he could be Steve's again.

 _It won't work,_ he thought. _I'll hurt him. That's all I do._

"No," he said out loud, grinding it through his teeth. " _No._ " He hadn't hurt Clint, and he wouldn't. Nat would make sure of it.

He'd ask Clint in the morning, and maybe it would be okay.

* * *

"Excuse me for interrupting, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. said right after cutting off the music, "but Captain Rogers is requesting entrance."

Tony blinked and glanced at the door, where Steve was standing with his palm on the glass. He looked…really bad. Like something terrible had happened but he had no choice but to soldier on anyway. "Oh, fuck. Sure, J. Let him in. I hope you're not looking for cuddles," he said to Steve, partially just to prolong the inevitable shit before it hit the turbine. "Because you know I love you, but there's no way in hell you're getting on my lap."

Steve's expression didn't so much as twitch, which only confirmed that this was going to suck. "I'm not here for that."

"Glad to hear it. You'd crush me like a grape." Tony clapped his hands together and clasped them, trying to sound like he wasn't dreading anything. "So, what can I do for you?"

Steve opened his mouth, then closed it again and ran his fingers through his hair. "I need you to find some files for me. Files about Bucky."

Oh, yeah, this was definitely going to suck. "Why?" Tony asked. "And, um, why me? Shouldn't you be going to our resident super-hot spy for this? I mean, she put this stuff up on the internet in the first place," he added, because it was true and he wasn't above pawning Steve's misery off on someone eminently more suited to deal with it.

Steve lifted his chin, drawing his shoulders back like he was ready for a fight. "Because Natasha might try to talk me out of it, since she wouldn't want me to be hurt."

The way he said _hurt_ instead of _upset_ was telling, but Tony didn't know of what. "Shit," he said on a breath. "Are you sure _I_ shouldn't be trying to talk you out of it? Because I don't want you to be hurt either."

Steve shook his head. "I need to do this, Tony. I lost Bucky once. Now I'm losing him again, and I don't even know why. And…" He stopped and looked away. His jaw worked like he was trying not to cry and holy hell that was terrifying. "And what's happening right now…it's hurting just as much as…as thinking he died. Maybe more." He swallowed, but then lifted his head again and his eyes were red-rimmed but dry. "I have to know why he's acting like this, what happened to him."

"First of all, you're scaring me here. What do you mean, you're losing him? I mean, I know you two have been a little...." Tony winced. "Okay, a lot on shaky ground lately. Like, earthquake-level shaky ground. But...you're losing him?" He sucked in a breath. "Is he sick? No, wait. You guys can't get sick. So, not that." His eyes went huge. "Oh my God, is he cheating on you? Because, um, I'd really rather not get in the middle of that."

"He's not cheating on me," Steve said immediately, thank God. "I know he's spending time with Clint, and I'm fine with that." He made a face like he was internally chastising himself. "No, I'm not fine with that. But I can accept it. He needs a friend, and I'm glad Clint can be one. But…" He swallowed again. "I told him to move out last night."

"Oh, fuck me." Tony smacked his face and drew his palm down, peeking at Steve over his fingertips. "You know it's, like, eight o'clock at night now, right?"

Steve nodded. "I've been debating with myself whether I should do this." Which, Tony was sure, was the only reason he hadn't been dragged out of bed at whatever dark in the morning. "I know Bucky didn't want to leave. But, he keeps saying that he can't be with me."

"Can't?" Tony repeated, confused. "What's stopping him?"

"That's the thing. I don't know. He said it's because 'they're all dead'."

"Who? Who ends up dead?" Tony lifted his hands again when Steve opened his mouth to doubtless give another useless morsel of an explanation. "No, wait. Wait. Back up. You need to start from the beginning, here, Ice King. I don't even know what you're asking me to find."

"What the Red Room or Hydra did to him, to make him terrified of being with a sub. From what he said…" Steve bit his lip. "I think there must've been subs who were killed. And, and probably by him. But I don't know for sure. Or why their deaths would've affected him like this."

Tony scrubbed his face with his hand. "Jesus. You're not asking for much, are you? You sure you want to open that box, Cap? I mean, if he didn't tell you, maybe it's 'cause he didn't want you to know. And, I hate to be the one to suggest courtesy or restraint but, does he even know you're doing this?"

"No," Steve said, and even though that was exactly what Tony expected his heart sank. "And I know I should ask him. Of course I do. And if he was getting help, from anyone, I wouldn't be here. But he's not getting help, and he's not dealing with this on his own. It's getting worse."

Tony nodded unhappily. "Yeah. I kind of noticed. You two are like the Cold War all over again."

Steve nodded mutely, then sat heavily in the chair next to the lab table and put his face in his hands.

"Fuck me," Tony murmured. He hated seeing his friends upset, especially when they were subs. It made whatever few protective Dom instincts he had go crazy with the need to do something. Only he never knew what.

He shuffled closer, trying to channel Pepper and do what she would, then started carding his fingers through Steve's hair. "All right," he said, trying to keep it casual as if he did this kind of thing with Steve all the time. "Are we looking for files about subs the Winter Soldier might've killed? Because that could be, um, a lot."

Steve gently took Tony's wrist and moved his hand away. "Thank you. But not now." He put his hand over his mouth as he thought. "These weren't missions. They seemed...more personal."

"Personal sub deaths." Tony repeated, deadpan. "I am going to regret this so much."

"I'm sorry, Tony," Steve said, because it was Steve. "I hate having to come to you for this. But I couldn't find anything on my own. And I don't know what else to do anymore."

Tony waved him off. "Don't worry about it." He took a fortifying breath. "J? You heard the Captain—what do we have from our good Red Room and Hydra friends about the Winter Soldier and subs? Or, um, the Asset, I guess."

It took J.A.R.V.I.S. more than a second to respond, which was both impressive and awful. "I've found three submissives mentioned in the files concerning the Winter Soldier, sir. There are both audio/visual and paper files, dating between 1949 and 1991, when Sergeant Barnes was a prisoner of the Red Room. All materials are in Russian, but I would be happy to translate. What would you like first?"

Tony looked at Steve. "Your call."

"Video," Steve said immediately. "The Soviets wrote the paper files. I don't want to hear their lies."

"Of course, captain," J.A.R.V.I.S. said. "But I feel I should warn you that some of the film recordings are quite graphic. And more than likely disturbing."

"Great," Tony muttered. 

"You don't have to be here, Tony. You can leave," Steve said.

Tony shook his head. "Nope. We're in this together, Spangles. There's no way I'm letting you watch this horror movie alone."

"You're a good friend, Tony." Steve's smile was sad, but so sweet and genuine that Tony couldn't help smiling back at him.

"Hopefully you'll still think that after I let you watch this." He took another breath, and then realized he was just stalling out of fear and scowled at himself. "Roll 'em, J."

* * *

Bucky took a deep breath, then knocked on the door. 

"I'll get it!" A moment later the door opened to reveal Clint in a pair of jeans that were pale and soft with age, and his plain black leather collar. Bucky couldn't help taking a moment to appreciate it.

He'd never had the chance to give Steve a collar. He was glad now that he hadn't. One less thing to regret when he already had so many.

Clint pushed his fingers through his hair, making it even more unruly. "If the jeans aren't okay, I can go change them."

Bucky put on his best smile. "It's fine. You look good."

Clint grinned and stepped back, gracefully gesturing for Bucky to enter. For all that Clint could be rough around the edges, when he was serving his time as a performer became obvious. 

The small dining table was set for two: Bucky and Natasha. There was a dining cushion on the floor between the two chairs for Clint. 

Bucky looked at Natasha, who was sitting on the couch assembling a weapon. He gestured at the table. "Why does Clint keep trying to feed me?"

"It's not just for you." She smiled at Clint. "Handfeeding helps to get him into subspace." She arched an eyebrow. "Besides, have you actually eaten tonight?"

He shrugged, which probably told her everything she needed to know. He hadn't eaten anything all day, actually. It seemed like too much effort to bother with.

Nat's smile was knowing but kind. She turned to Clint. "Serve us, please." She gestured for Bucky to sit. "I thought we could go over the I.C.E.R."

It was a new weapon, created by a couple of baby-genius S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. It looked like an ordinary handgun, but apparently it shot a kind of sedative that could knock out an elephant.

He wasn't convinced. "What if it doesn't work?" 

She gave him a head tilt. "Then I'll kill you."

He nodded, relieved, but Clint let out an indignant squawk from the kitchen.

"No killing during my scene!"

" _Your_ scene?" Natasha asked mildly. 

Clint stepped out of the kitchen. "I would never argue with my Domme," he said in a tone of voice that was completely and utterly arguing. "But it's at least half my scene."

Natasha snorted, clearly amused despite herself. "I suppose so."

Steve would pull that kind of shit all the time. Bucky tried not to think about it.

"Food's ready," Clint said, bouncing a little bit.

Natasha gave him a look of mild censure. "Please be careful, Clint. Your ankle hasn't finished healing."

Bucky winced inwardly, though he was careful to keep his easy smile. He was the reason Clint's ankle was broken.

He shouldn't be here. But he saw how eager Clint was, and the love shining behind the amusement in Natasha's eyes, and he couldn't bring himself to just leave. And he was so sick of being afraid. 

Bucky and Natasha sat in the chairs as Clint brought in small bowls of cooked meat, warm bread and fresh fruit. There were smaller bowls of sauces for dipping. It smelled good. 

Clint settled cross-legged on the cushion on the floor, then got up. "I forgot forks." He rushed back into the kitchen, rushed back out with the forks, and then placed them precisely next to the Dom's plates. He sat on the cushion again, but bounced up a second later. "Wine." He poured the wine, then went to sit again. This time he barely touched the cushion before he got up. 

Bucky reached for his arm, then realized what he was doing and snatched his hand away. He'd touched Clint before, they'd even danced together. But, Jesus. What had he been thinking, grabbing at a sub like that? This wasn't dancing; Clint wasn't expecting it. And bones were so easy to break….

"You should have stopped him," Nat said to Bucky as Clint returned with water glasses. "Sit," she ordered Clint.

Clint sat.

Bucky shook his head, clenching and unclenching his left hand. "I could've hurt him."

"You didn't." Natasha stroked her hand over Clint's hair and he leaned against her thigh. "Your instinct was to take his arm. Why?" she asked Bucky. 

Bucky glanced at Clint, but he didn't seem to mind being talked about. "He'll just keep getting up, and never give himself a chance to relax enough to settle."

She nodded. "Clint's nervous, and trying too hard."

"No I'm not!" Clint said hotly. " _Gospoža_ ," he added meekly when Natasha gave a slight tug to his hair.

Natasha went back to petting him. "What would you do if this were Steve, James?"

The last thing Bucky wanted to do was think about Steve, but he didn't even have to figure it out; he just knew. "Make it so he couldn't get up. It'd force him to relax."

"I have cuffs," Clint said hopefully.

Bucky shook his head, trying not to notice how Clint's face fell. "What if I hurt him? You don't even have the I.C.E.R. ready."

Natasha deliberately placed the gun next to her plate. She cocked an eyebrow. "All you've done so far is sit at the table. You manage that without violence at the team dinners at least once a week."

"This is different." Bucky looked at his plate, letting his hair hide part of his face. "It's just the three of us."

Natasha put her hand over his. It looked incredibly small and fragile, like he'd barely have to make a fist to break it. He was losing his mind. "You're doing fine, Bucky."

He tried very hard to believe her.

"How would you restrain him?" Natasha asked.

Bucky thought about it for a moment. Considering it like it a tactical problem helped make it less personal and dangerous. "Ankles tied or chained, to keep him sitting. Hands cuffed so he isn't tempted to fix things on the table."

"Excellent." Natasha tugged Clint's hair again and he looked at her adoringly. "Could you please get your cuffs, and a length of rope?"

"Yes, _gospoža._ " Clint bounded to his feet and limped to the bedroom.

Natasha smiled fondly as she watched him, then took a sip of wine. "You were doing aerials with Clint just the night before. That didn't break him."

Bucky looked away, "I could've, though."

She squeezed his hand a little. "Maybe. But he also could've hurt you. He told me about the moves you did. If he'd made a mistake he would have castrated you at least once. Especially with his cast." She smirked lightly at Bucky's wince. "My point is, you're both fine, and he really enjoyed dancing with you. And all I'm asking you to do tonight is to help him to go down."

"I know."

"Good." She smiled warmly at him. "Clint, we're waiting for you," she called down the hallway.

Almost immediately Clint threw the bedroom door open and limped back to them. He held out a deep purple set of cuffs and a soft black cord. "These're my favorite." He grinned.

Bucky made sure he grinned back, didn't hesitate before he took the offered bindings. He used to do this with Steve, easy as anything; no reason to be anxious now. "So, I'm going to tie your ankles then cuff your wrists so you'll stop jumping around. If you need something, I'll get it, okay? But if you don't relax, I swear to God I'm going to beat you to death with a spoon." He froze as soon as he realized what he'd said, but all he'd done was startle a laugh out of Clint.

Bucky hauled his grin back, relieved, and knelt to tie Clint's ankles. He looped the cord so loosely around the cast that Clint could've shook it off, then carefully cuffed his wrists in front of him. "You're doing great," he said, because he remembered how much Steve liked being praised. He knew he'd at least done something right when Clint beamed. "Are the bindings tight enough?"

"You could make them tighter."

Bucky tightened the cord and the cuffs just enough to be barely functional. It was the best he could make himself do. 

"That's better." Clint smiled at him like he was the sub in need of reassurance.

Bucky flickered a smile back and sat down. There were beads of stress sweat at his temples. He pushed his hair back to hide wiping them away. _Get a grip_ , he snarled inwardly in Russian. "You comfortable? You need anything?"

Clint glanced at the table, then at Bucky, gave a rueful smile and shook his head.

Bucky petted his head as reward, then forked up a piece of the steak, dipped it in one of the sauces, and carefully fed it to Clint. Clint took it with a delicacy that maybe wasn't so surprising when Bucky thought about how well he could dance and fight.

While he was focused on the meal, it was almost easy. Clint was eager and beautifully obedient. That was nice, but it also hurt like hell. Steve had been like that too, every time Bucky earned his submission. He'd also loved to be handfed. Bucky felt like he was cheating on him, being with anyone else.

 _You're doing this for him_ , he reminded himself fiercely. It didn't help.

He gulped the last of his wine, wishing it could do a damn thing for him, then helped Clint to finish his own. "Have you had enough? Do you need anything else?"

"I'm fine, thank you," Clint said a little dreamily. He was more relaxed, but he was still too alert, not down far enough. Bucky was failing. He licked his lips anxiously, glancing at Natasha.

She was sitting back in her chair, watching with a smile on her face, as if Bucky somehow hadn't fucked up from the beginning. The I.C.E.R. lay next to her plate like a piece of cutlery. "You can sit him at your feet while you read, or feel free to do something more involved, if you want."

Bucky looked down at Clint. "What do you need?"

"Pet me?"

Bucky pasted on another smile. "That I can do." He knelt long enough to undo the cord around Clint's ankles. "Where would you like to do this?" It wasn't normal to let the sub decide, but it was safer.

"Living room?" Clint glanced at Natasha for guidance.

"This is between you and Bucky," she said.

"Living room's fine," Bucky said quickly, before he wound Clint up again.

"Great!"

Bucky couldn't help but smile a little at his enthusiasm. Clint was nothing like Steve. Steve would've made him work so much harder than this.

He really needed to stop thinking about him.

"C'mere, then." Bucky went and sprawled on the couch as if he were relaxed. "How do you want to do this? Do you still need the cuffs?"

Clint went from sitting on the cushion to his feet in one jump. He stumbled, making the cast clunk loudly, but recovered fast. He sauntered over, barely favoring his bad leg and looking at Natasha and Bucky to make sure they'd seen him showing off.

Bucky just arched an eyebrow the way Natasha would, pleased when it made Clint laugh. "Cuffs on or off?"

"Cuffs on, please. I like them." There was a big, soft cushion on the floor already, well-used and worn. Bucky thought Clint would sit cross-legged again, like he had at the table. 

Clint knelt, with his head bowed.

Bucky's heartbeat sped up so quickly that for a second he thought he would puke. But this wasn't Steve. This wasn't Grisha. The only weapon here was Natasha's, and she'd promised she'd use it before Clint could get hurt.

Clint wouldn't get hurt. He'd knelt for Bucky before, and that had turned out okay. So this would be okay too. Bucky would make this okay if it killed him.

Better him killed than another sub, anyway.

Bucky forced his hands out of their tight fists, then began to card his fingers through Clint's hair. He did his best not to think of anything other than the simple, repetitive movement. "Is this all right?" he asked softly.

Clint had his eyes closed and looked blissfully unaware of how hard Bucky was working to stay calm. "Mmm, that's great. You can do it harder if you want."

Bucky snatched his hand back, then relaxed it with an effort. "Yeah. Sure." He could do this. He pressed down on Clint's head just a little harder. He'd petted Clint like this when he was explaining physics. He hadn't even thought about it then, and it'd been fine. It would be fine now too. It was fine. He'd make it fine.

"Red."

Bucky jerked like he'd been shot, then yanked his hand away from Clint and all but threw himself off the couch. He broke the cuffs with his hands, careful not to hurt Clint more than he already had. He looked for bleeding, broken bones, bruises. God, what had he even done? "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Are you okay? What did I do?"

Clint winced a bit as he shifted off of his ankle. "Nothing. It's just my ankle. It'll be fine in a bit."

"I'm sorry." Bucky looked at Natasha. "What did I do?" 

Natasha was already at her sub's side. "He said his ankle was aching. You didn't hear him." She took Clint's arm and helped him onto the couch. Bucky scrambled to his feet, giving them plenty of room. Natasha knelt down herself to inspect Clint's ankle. "You hurt it with that stunt, didn't you?" She didn't wait for an answer. "I'll get some ibuprofen and an ice pack."

Bucky sank back onto his heels on the floor, and curled into a ball with his face on his forearms. "I'm sorry."

"It happens. You responded when he safeworded," she said, like that was the only part that mattered; not that Clint had been forced to safeword for Bucky to even notice he was in pain. "I'll be right back." She stood, giving Clint a mild glare. "Don't move."

Bucky forced himself to lift his head. He pushed his hair back out of his face. His hands were shaking.

"Will you be okay?" Natasha asked him.

He nodded, scraped up a smile from somewhere. "Sure. Get the stuff for him."

"I'll be right back," Natasha said again, reassuring him and warning Clint at the same time.

Bucky made his smile wider. "Great."

Natasha gave him a lingering look, like she knew something was up but wasn't going to call him on it. He just kept his expression open and easy until she finally headed down the hallway towards the bathroom medicine cabinet.

"I'm sorry," Bucky said to Clint, and bolted.

* * *

He ran, racing down the stairwell like the fucking tower was on fire.

He wasn't proud of it, but there was nothing about himself he'd been proud of for a long time now, and it was easy to shove that down with all the rest of it. The important thing was getting the fuck away from Clint, anyway.

Bucky was such a fucking idiot. He should've known it'd go to hell. He was just damn lucky he hadn't done anything worse. What if they'd gotten as far as an actual scene? It made him sick to his stomach, imagining what he might've done. He couldn't even keep Clint safe sitting on the goddamn couch. He probably would've torn him apart if he'd actually been trying to hurt him. Just like he did to Steve. Just like he'd done to all of them. What the fuck had he been thinking?

He stopped on one of the landings, leaning against the concrete wall with his chest heaving like he'd run way farther down than a few lousy floors. "Fuck." He brought his right fist down next to his hip, slamming it into the wall. "Fuck. _Fuck._ " All he'd done was prove he was everything he'd told Steve he was. No reason to feel so disappointed.

He wanted to go to the gym, run until he could maybe slide into that black space where he didn't have to exist for a while. Of course, even if he managed it he'd have to come out eventually. And he wasn't dressed for running.

"Excuse me, sergeant." J.A.R.V.I.S. spoke softly but still startled the hell out of him. "Agents Barton and Romanov would like to know where you are. May I inform them?"

"No." Nice of the robot to ask, but Bucky had a feeling that the A.I. was going to finagle a way to let Natasha and Clint know where he was without actually saying anything. He scrammed, leaping over the rail to drop down to the lower staircase, then doing it again and again until he thought he had enough of a lead. He didn't want to see the recrimination or sympathy or whatever it'd be on their faces. And he sure as hell didn't want to have to explain.

By the time he'd dropped to the bottom of the stairwell Bucky's feet and legs were aching. He thought he might have a couple stress fractures, but he'd had way worse and really didn't give a damn. They'd go away. Everything did, eventually.

He was in the private garage now, the lowest floor of the Tower. It pretty much just held Tony Stark's cars, with parking space for the other Avengers. Steve's vintage motorcycle was sitting in its customary spot near the hangar-sized garage door. There was an empty space next to it for Bucky's bike, of course. Because Steve was nothing if not hopelessly optimistic. But trying to live in the world you wanted never got you anywhere.

Bucky stalked towards Steve's motorcycle, then changed his mind and went to the nearest car instead. Didn't matter if Stark left it locked or hid the keys or whatever. There wasn't a window Bucky's left fist couldn't break, and he could hotwire anything.

"I'm terribly sorry, sergeant," J.A.R.V.I.S. spoke from the middle of fucking nowhere again. He actually sounded apologetic, which wasn't good. "I truly understand and respect your request for privacy. But if you touch one of sir's vehicles without permission, I will be required to inform him."

Bucky stopped dead with his hand hovering over the door handle of Tony's Lotus, then whipped it back. "Thanks, J." He ran to the emergency exit instead.

"I'm afraid I've also been given express orders to prevent you leaving the building," J.A.R.V.I.S. said before Bucky could touch that door either.

" _What?_ " His stomach lurched, a cold, dread rage filling his guts like stones. "I thought I wasn't a prisoner."

"You most assuredly are not," J.A.R.V.I.S. said. "But your vital signs indicate that you are in extreme distress, and standard protocol is to prevent anyone in that state from leaving."

"If I'm not a prisoner, then let me get the fuck out of here." He whirled and stalked to the garage door and tried to open it. But even using both hands and all his strength, it wouldn't budge. He'd been in Hydra installations easier to get out of than this.

He backed up a few steps then threw himself at the door, leading with his left shoulder. The _clang_ felt loud enough to shake the whole tower, but the hit didn't do anything. He tried it again, grunting as much in anger as effort, and then again. He'd hurled himself into the door for a fifth time before he dimly realized he was just taking out his anger on the metal and not doing a damn thing other than hurting himself.

"They know where I am yet?" he asked J.A.R.V.I.S. He wasn't winded, but he'd bruised the hell out of the flesh surrounding the shoulder socket. There was something grimly satisfying about the pain.

"I have so far been able to avoid revealing your whereabouts, sergeant," the A.I. said. "But I must ask you to cease this activity, before you damage either sir's property or yourself."

"Sure," Bucky murmured. Then punched the door as hard as he could with his left hand.

He hadn't gone beyond a vague idea that he'd be able to bash his way through, though he was distantly aware that the emergency exit door would be easier to break.

He kept hitting anyway, alternating fists like he was going at the heavy bag in the gym. He knew, sort of, that he was snarling and howling in rage like some kind of animal. He could hear J.A.R.V.I.S. urging him to stop, just like he could hear the snapping of bone in his right fist. There were blood smears on the metal. He knew he was doing himself a lot of harm.

But he didn't stop. Not even when every backswing scattered blood and the animal sounds slid from rage into pain. He kept going until he fell through the pain into the dark.

* * *

"I hope you forgive me for enabling you," Tony said.

A holographic screen snapped into existence in front of them. The image was in black and white, the camera focused on a man in a weedy 1940s suit. The room behind him was industrial concrete, textbook Stalin-era USSR. The man looked apologetic and frightened, with his stubby fingers plucking at the file in front of him like spastic little crabs. Tony wanted to slap him just for existing.

The man cleared his throat then started speaking. J.A.R.V.I.S. filled in precise, white subtitles at the bottom of the screen.

"This is file number 82, June 4, 1951. Update on the Winter Soldier." The weedy guy cleared his throat again, then used a handkerchief to blot the sweat off his forehead. "It has, unfortunately, come to our attention that Vanya, code name Winter Soldier, has been having inappropriate relations with two members of his unit in the field. These are the subs Alina Vasilovna and Timur Ruslanavitch, who, as reported by Yelizaveta Ivanova, have slept on either side of Vanya during the last three missions. She further reports that he has fed them. By, ah, hand." The man winced, like he knew exactly how badly that tidbit especially would go down. "This, despite how we have _vigorously_ discouraged the Winter Soldier from any and all dominant tendencies."

"Yeah. Try to save your ass, you weedy fuck," Tony said.

"Shh," Steve's eyes were fixed on the screen.

"Further," Weedy kept waffling, "Ivanova has even noted both Timur and Alina giving Vanya gifts. These tokens, while small and meaningless on their own, are nonetheless signs of a deeper, far more disturbing trend. One we cannot allow to continue." Weedy stared at the camera with what Tony was sure he thought was an expression of grave competence, but made him look like a constipated rat. "I assure you, that this will be dealt with immediately and by the strictest means possible. I will send the follow up reports as soon as we have them."

The screen went black.

"Hang on, J," Tony said immediately. "Last chance," he said to Steve. "We don't have to find out what the hell 'strictest means possible' is."

Tony wasn't surprised when Steve shook his head. Unhappy, but not surprised. "Whatever it is, Bucky endured it. The least I can do is bear witness." His face was heartbreakingly kind. "You can leave, Tony. I won't judge you for that."

"I know, Cap. But I'll judge me for that. Show the next reel, J.A.R.V.I.S.," he said before he could change his mind.

"Immediately, sir, though I must repeat my earlier warning."

"I'm aware. It's gonna suck. Bring it."

The film started.

This time the camera focused on a room that could've been a cell if you wanted to be nice about it. It was all bleak, cracked concrete, with the kind of stains that even in black and white looked like nothing Tony would ever want to know about. The floor dipped to a drain in the center, right beneath a set of chains hanging from the ceiling. A third of the chain was stained by what Tony knew had to be blood. This wasn't a room anyone came out of intact.

It was empty, except for the camera recording nothing. And then Bucky was led in. On a leash, with a collar around his neck.

"Oh, fuck," Tony said.

Steve gasped. "Oh my God." He stood, leaning forward as if was trying to will himself into the horror unspooling in front of them.

Bucky looked like someone went to town on him with a sledgehammer. He was covered in bruises and blood, limping so badly it was hard to see how he could even walk. His wrists were chained in front of him, and those chains were attached to a thick leather belt around his waist to keep him from raising his hands. There was no way in hell the kid could run, but his legs were chained together anyway.

Bucky's head was down, but it was impossible to know if it was because of exhaustion, pain, or if he'd been forced into some kind of submission. Tony had a bad feeling it was all three. Bucky was naked too, other than the belt and the collar. On first glance the collar reminded Tony of the kind the punk subs had back in the 80s: wide black leather with a heavy ring in the front and an equally heavy chain attached to it. But it was easy to see the glint of wires. "It's electrified," he whispered. "Those were outlawed after World War One."

Steve just nodded. He jutted his chin at the picture. "They've used it already. You can see the burns."

Tony's eyes weren't that good, which right then was awesome. Collars were supposed to be a symbol of a fully committed relationship, and even then it was the sub's choice if they wore it or not. Seeing a Dom forced into a collar for punishment was such an abomination that Tony found himself swallowing bile.

Bucky was led to two huge metal rings set in the wall. One of the several guards unlocked Bucky's wrists from the belt. All the other thugs aimed their machine guns at the mess of Bucky's torso until the manacle on each of his wrists was attached to one of the rings in the wall. The rings were at the perfect angle and height to keep him from relaxing his arms. That would've been uncomfortable for anyone, but given how badly he'd been fucked up, it had to hurt Bucky like hell.

"Don't move," the guard with the keys said to him. And then they all left.

"The film continues for approximately ten hours, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. said.

" _Ten hours?_ " Tony gaped at Steve. "They beat the shit out of him then expect him to not move for ten fucking hours?"

Steve swallowed. "What happens in those ten hours, J.A.R.V.I.S.?"

"Nothing, captain. He doesn't move, as instructed."

Steve closed his eyes, then scrubbed his face with his hand. "Please skip to when something changes."

"Of course, captain."

The playback started again with Bucky in the exact same position, looking like he was fighting to stay conscious. His arms were trembling so violently that Tony could hear the chains rattling.

Bucky suddenly snapped his head up, and a few seconds later the door to the cell opened. More guards came in, two of them roughly pulling a handcuffed young man and woman with them. These two were also naked and bruised, though nowhere near as badly.

Steve's eyes widened. "Those are the subs, aren't they?"

The video paused. "Yes, captain."

"Jesus Christ," Tony said. "We're watching a fucking snuff film."

"Tony—"

"I'm staying."

"Please pardon my not recommencing immediately, captain, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. said. "But I thought I should ask, would you like Sergeant Barnes' words to be translated in subtitles as with the others? Or would you prefer I simply summarize? Or not translate at all?"

"Up to you, Steve," Tony said.

"Translate, please," he said quietly.

"Of course, captain," J.A.R.V.I.S. said, as gently as possible for a machine. "I shall continue."

On the screen Bucky called to the subs, straining against his manacles until someone hit the control for his collar. Tony couldn't help the noise he made, watching Bucky seize helplessly, unable to even scream. Steve's yell of denial sounded like it tore out of him.

When the collar finally shut off, Bucky slumped in his chains with his head hanging. Both the horrorstruck subs were yelling _Vanya! Vanya!_ and struggling to reach him. Their attempts were so sweet and loyal and tragic that Tony didn't know if he should cheer or cry.

The woman, who was wiry and vicious and reminded Tony of Pepper, managed to fight her way out of the grip of the guards. She made it all the way across the room, putting her cuffed hands on Bucky's bleeding chest. "Don't fight! Don't fight! Not for us," she had time to beg him before she was pistol whipped to the floor, then dragged by her hair to the center of the room.

"Alina! Alina!" Bucky was shaking, straining to get to her. Fresh blood spattered the wall and floor every time he moved.

The guards yanked Alina up by her arms, then attached her cuffs to the chain hanging from the ceiling. There was a sound of machinery and the chain retracted, pulling her up by her arms, then continuing to lift her until she was forced to balance on her toes, all but dangling.

Like the pageant this so clearly was, the weedy guy came in in with an officer of some kind walking just behind him. Weedy strolled up to Bucky, hands in the pockets of his cheap suit. Tony was sure Weedy would never have the balls to do that if Bucky wasn't chained and beaten within an inch of his life.

"I need you to understand, Vanya, that what happens next is your fault," Weedy said. "We wouldn't have had to do this, except that you failed to follow orders."

Bucky blinked at him in confusion, then looked wildly from Weedy to the two subs. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, sir," he said, his voice creaking from fear and privation and pain. "Please…whatever I did, let me take the punishment. Don't hurt them for my failure. Please don't hurt them." His subtitles were in red, standing out like blood against the greyscale of the film.

Weedy's hand moved in his pocket and Bucky and arched as he was shocked again, groaning though his clenched teeth. The male sub kept calling to him, and Alina spun in her chains, screaming at Weedy to stop, stop, _stop!_ until the same guard who'd chained her punched her in the stomach.

"No. No. You sick bastards," Steve snarled, tears running down his face.

When the electricity shut off this time Weedy stepped back so the officer could lift Bucky's head by a fistful of his hair. Drool and blood covered his chin.

"You are in no position to bargain, Vanya," Weedy said. "You do not dominate, little soldier. You obey." He caught the officer's eye then jutted his chin at Alina. The officer gave him a sharp nod, then dropped Bucky and went to the sub, taking a military flogger from his belt.

"Oh, fuck no," Tony said, as if that could somehow change anything.

"Remember, Vanya, this is your fault," Weedy said, and signaled the officer to begin.

The officer whipped Alina's back and shoulders thirty times, stopping after fifteen to rest his arm and wipe the sweat off his face with a handkerchief. Tony had to leave the room somewhere after the twentieth lash, when Alina finally fainted (God, he hoped she fainted) and Bucky had likely dislocated his right shoulder trying to get to her.

Tony stood outside his workshop, leaning against the glass door in a cold sweat and trying not to puke. He could still hear the _thwack_ of the flogger, and Bucky and the other sub's screams.

After Alina, Weedy shocked Bucky again, then reminded him that the subs' punishment was his fault. Then it was the man's turn. His name was Timur. Tony could hear Bucky screaming it. 

Tony forced himself to go back inside when the lashes stopped.

The blood streaking Timur's body looked like ink in the harsh monochrome. The sub was hanging limply from the chains, and he dropped to the concrete as soon as the guard released him. Alina was curled on the floor near the far wall.

Bucky was still pulling against his manacles. His face was streaked with tears and there was blood still running out his mouth. He kept calling to both the subs, begging them to answer.

Two guards dragged Timur next to Alina, then forced them both up onto their knees. Alina managed to stay upright, barely, but a guard had to hold Timur by his arm.

The officer who'd whipped them both walked smartly up to Timur and stood next to him. At Weedy's nod he drew his pistol.

Bucky went insane.

He screamed and fought like a wild animal, pulling so hard that Tony heard a bone snap before Bucky yanked the ring attached to the manacle on his left hand right out of the wall. 

He used it as a weapon to smash in the skull of the first guard stupid enough to come at him. He broke the chain on his right wrist and had killed another two guards by the time Weedy finally stopped pissing himself long enough to electrocute Bucky again.

Five guards held Bucky face down on the floor as Weedy came over and crouched in front of him. "Remember that what happens next is your fault, Vanya. This is entirely because of you. Because you couldn't remember your place." He stood awkwardly and turned to the officer. "Do it."

Bucky was still pleading for Alina and Timur's lives when the officer shot them both in the head. 

There was a long silence after J.A.R.V.I.S. stopped the film.

"No wonder," Steve said quietly. He wiped his eyes with the heels of his hands. 

"Yeah." Tony rubbed Steve's back, wishing he knew the hell what to say. "He has to know those Soviet fucks hurt the subs, not him. How the hell could he think that was his fault?

"He had no memories. No context, no real idea of what was right or wrong. All he had to make sense of his life was what they told him."

"Yeah, but...not anymore," Tony said, a little desperately. "I mean, he remembers now, right? How could he still think it was his fault?"

"Because they told him that they tortured and killed the subs only because he acted like a Dom. And he believed them," Steve said with awful certainty. "And somewhere inside he never stopped believing them."

"Excuse me, sir, captain," J.A.R.V.I.S. cut in, "but there was one other documented incident of the Winter Soldier requiring correction due to fraternization with a submissive. This incident occurred more recently, shortly before Sergeant Barnes was transferred to Hydra. If I may, I urge you not to watch it. I believe you would find it particularly disturbing."

"What, you mean it's _worse?_ " Tony demanded.

Steve just took another one of his deep, stoic breaths. "If it's worse, that means we need to see it. It would've affected him more."

"Oh, God." Tony screwed the heel of his hand into an eye socket. "I knew I should've gone to bed early tonight. All right," he said on a breath of his own. "Show us, please."

"Very well, sir." J.A.R.V.I.S. sounded hesitant. "I have, however, for the sake of Sergeant Barnes' privacy, omitted translating a portion of the first part."

Steve and Tony shared a look. "Yeah, sure, J," Tony said. 

This was converted video, not film, obviously decades later. This time the room was in color, though barely less utilitarian than the previous one. There was a boxy, late-80s IBM computer in the foreground.

The weedy guy was gone, replaced by the kind of sneering, Gordon Gekko type of ambitious fuck Tony hated even when he was one. Gekko looked harried and bored and pissed off.

"Update on the Winter Soldier, File 228, November 15, 1990," Gekko said, then grimaced at the camera. "This is a follow up report re: concerns that Vanya, codenamed Winter Soldier, has begun expressing dominant instincts, which had been documented as successfully repressed since 1951." Gekko looked annoyed about that, as if Bucky had done it just to irritate him. Tony wanted to punch him in his crooked teeth. "The concerns, as expressed in file 227, have proven valid, per Appendix 1 of this video file. Discipline will be administered immediately, per Comrade Nikliovitch's instructions. However, given the particular severity of this transgression, I have proposed a harsher punishment, per Appendix 2."

"His last transgression was sleeping with his subs and taking care of them. How could this one be _worse?_ " Steve breathed.

"I don't want to know," Tony said truthfully. "But I'm guessing it's in Appendix 1." He sucked in air through his teeth, wishing that Pepper were there or that he was with her or any place other than in his workshop about to watch Bucky being dragged through Hell again. "J.A.R.V.I.S.? Do I win a prize?"

"You are correct, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. said. "Shall I play the video, captain?"

Steve nodded.

The screen changed to an image taken from an early version of a pinhole-type camera. The picture was distorted and in shades of greyish green, but it was still obviously pointed at the inside of a cheap hotel room. Tony could tell from the angle that the camera would've been impossible to find for anyone not specifically looking for one.

There was a large, efficient rifle on a tripod near the only window. Bucky—because that was so obviously Bucky there, sitting on the bed—had to be waiting for the target. Tony thought it might be the sub, that maybe Bucky's transgression was leaving the poor guy alive.

And then another man came out of the bathroom, wearing jeans and drying his hair, and the way Bucky lit up when he saw him told Tony everything he needed to know.

"Oh fuck," Steve whispered, because of course he'd seen it too.

It was hard to make out the sub's features with the lousy picture, but he was shorter than Bucky and seemed younger. He looked sturdy, with large arms, wide chest and shoulders.

Tony blinked, then looked at Steve, then back at the young man on the screen. "Holy fuck," he said, gaping. "Holy _fuck._ Steve…that guy. He kind of looks like you."

Steve's eyes widened in astonished horror. "No. Oh, God, no. Bucky."

"The information I've been able to acquire indicates that the young man is Grisha Romanoff, a promising candidate for the submissive and primarily male Brown Widow program," J.A.R.V.I.S. said. "This is a training mission with the Winter Soldier. As of this recording, Grisha has been Sergeant Barnes' apprentice for a little over four months."

J.A.R.V.I.S. hadn't translated what Bucky and Grisha were saying to each other. Bucky looked relaxed and happy, though, which was a huge and welcome difference from the last film. And the way he took Grisha's hands as the sub sat next to him…well. Tony wasn't surprised when Bucky cupped the side of his face and leaned in to kiss him.

"What did they do to him for that?" Steve said.

As if in answer, the video cut back to the office room. Gekko looked even more pissed off. His nose was badly broken.

"Addendum to File 228," Gekko snarled at the screen. "Despite extensive physical punishment, Vanya initially proved extremely reluctant to comply with the disciplinary action, resulting in the deaths or injury of thirty six members of this facility. A request for new personnel follows this file. We were forced to wipe the Winter Soldier three times in succession before he carried out his punishment, per Appendices 3, 4 and 5."

"He fought so hard," Steve said.

"Yeah," Tony rasped.

In the video, Gekko shifted a little, looking uncomfortable and nervous for the first time. "While Vanya was finally brought back to acceptable levels of tractability after the third wipe, he has so far demonstrated..." Tony did not like that pause, "…Somewhat reduced levels of interaction. We have every confidence, however, that given a few days' recuperation, he will return to all previous activity."

"That sounds like someone trying to sugarcoat a craptastic fuckup if I've ever heard one," Tony said.

"What the hell did they do to him?"

"Shall I play the appendices, captain?" J.A.R.V.I.S. asked.

Steve nodded. He wrapped both his hands around the edge of the lab table. The metal dented.

Appendix 3 started playing again in overly bright, late 80s color. This time the camera was aimed at the interior of another grotesquely utilitarian room, this one with grimy and cracked white tile instead of concrete. It was a torture chamber, because there was no way in hell those instruments neatly laid out like surgical tools could be for anything else. There was also a machine that looked just enough like a chair to make whatever purpose it had terrifying. Next to it was a bloodstained gurney that reminded Tony so much of Afghanistan that he had to close his eyes and just breathe for a bit.

Then Bucky was dragged in. He was naked again, though he was such a mess of bleeding injuries it hardly mattered. The few parts of him not covered in blood were horribly thin, streaked with sweat and dirt. His left arm was gone, in its place nothing but a metal housing spilling frayed wires.

The guards strapped him down into a metal chair that'd been bolted to the floor. It looked like the Hulk might've had a hard time breaking out of it. 

Gekko entered, smoothing imaginary lint off his suit. Tony had no idea how Bucky was even conscious, but he managed to lift his head to watch Gekko cross the room. Gekko stopped next to the chair, and Bucky's weary, pain filled eyes went dark with loathing.

Gekko tried to loom over Bucky, but he was too much of a slimy sycophant to sell it. "This will end as soon as you accept your punishment, Vanya," he said. "You were disobedient and now you must pay." He tried to make his voice cajoling, but he just sounded unctuous. "I want to help you, Vanya, but I can't. Not until you submit."

Bucky lolled his head in Gekko's direction and spat a gobbet of blood at him. It spattered on Gekko's cheap white shirt and Tony couldn't stop his exclamation of glee when Gekko skipped back with a shriek of terror. But then his expression darkened with rage, and he turned to someone off camera. "Wipe him."

The shot changed to the horror movie chair. Bucky was fighting like hell not to be strapped down, screaming, _I won't do it! I won't hurt him!_. The words were red as his blood on the bottom of the screen. He only had his right arm, but he still grabbed one of the techs and snapped the man's neck. His backswing was what nailed Gekko in the face. Tony couldn't hold back his cheer at that, either.

"Turn it off! Turn it off!" Gekko yelled, muffled through the blood gushing between his fingers. The screen went black.

When the picture returned, they weren't looking at the torture chamber anymore, but some kind of large cell, given the thick, rusting bars and the chains.

"The middle ages called. They want their dungeon back," Tony muttered. Steve didn't even glance away from the screen. 

Bucky was already there and looking even worse, something that until that second Tony wouldn't have thought possible. He had pants on, at least, but nothing else except a hobbling chain on his ankles and something that looked horribly like a muzzle covering his mouth and nose.

He had his left arm back. Somehow that didn't seem even remotely good.

Bucky's arms weren't chained either, maybe because he seemed to need the two guards gripping his arms to stay upright. His eyes above the muzzle were dull, and Tony remembered Gekko's 'wipe him' and shivered. God knew what that chair thing did to him.

Grisha was in the cell, also hobbled with his hands cuffed behind him. He looked like hell too, with one arm hanging funny and what Tony knew were broken ribs by all the bruising. The kid's eyes were so swollen he could barely see, but he still cried out when Bucky entered.

One of the guards on the sub kicked the back of his knee to make him kneel. Bucky tensed.

Gekko, who was now sporting the nose bandage, was standing safely on the other side of the metal bars when he ordered the guards to free Bucky's ankles. One of them put a pistol in Bucky's hand, which was possibly the stupidest thing Tony had ever seen. Except that Bucky just took it.

"Kill the sub," Gekko said.

"Oh, no. No, no, no," Steve whispered. He was crushing the table edge with his thumbs. "Oh, God. Bucky."

On the screen, Bucky blinked vaguely at Gekko, then at the gun he was holding like he didn't know what it was. Then he looked at Grisha, on his knees on the grimy floor. Grisha had tears running down his face, but he smiled.

"It'll all right, Vanya," he said. "I love you."

Bucky went still. And then he spun and shot at Gekko. Bucky's aim was a little off, given how he could barely stand, but the bullet still tore a nice chunk out of Gekko's arm. Then Bucky shot every guard in the room.

"Yes!" Steve's grin was feral through the tears on his face. "Yeah! Kill all of them!"

Bucky's defiance didn't last long. J.A.R.V.I.S. mercifully stopped the video as a fucking sea of armed guards rushed in, and Bucky ran out of bullets.

J.A.R.V.I.S. started playing appendix 4 immediately, maybe sensing that waiting wouldn't make it easier to take. This appendix seemed to have cut to the chase as well, because it started with Bucky in the same dungeon knockoff room.

Bucky was leaning heavily on the guards, though he looked so drugged or injured that he was barely aware of it. He wasn't hobbled this time because there was obviously no point, though one of the guards carried a long stick that looked like a cattle prod.

Gekko was well back from the bars, trying to look determined and confident and failing completely. The guard who gave Bucky the pistol made sure it only had one bullet this time. Bucky could barely hold it in his right hand.

Grisha was brought in, also looking worse. "Vanya? _Vanya?_ Oh my God, what did they do to you? Vanya!" He struggled in the implacable grip of the men holding his chained arms, trying to get to his Dom. A third guard came up behind Grisha and pistol whipped him.

Bucky gasped when he saw Grisha fall to his knees.

"Kill the sub, Vanya," Gekko said.

Bucky stood there for a long moment, holding the gun and swaying like a boat in a high wind. He shook his head.

Gekko swore viciously, then signaled to the guard with the prod. The man nodded then jabbed Bucky in his side. Bucky screamed and collapsed to the ground when his legs gave out.

"Get up," Gekko snarled at him. " _Get. Up._ " He waited with his arms crossed while Bucky struggled back to his feet. He'd dropped the gun. The guard handed it to him.

"Do it!" Gekko yelled. "Shoot him! Kill him!"

Bucky tried to shoot himself instead. He was so weak that the closest guard managed to shove the gun up. The bullet only grazed Bucky's temple before going into the ceiling.

"Fuck!" Gekko stamped his foot like a petulant child. He calmed with obvious effort. "Bring him back to the chair and wipe him again."

Appendix 5 started back in the room with the chains and the cage. Bucky staggered in, flanked by guards and holding his right arm. It was so badly broken Tony could see the shape of the misaligned bone. The dullness in Bucky's eyes had been replaced by an absence so profound it was terrifying.

When Grisha was brought into the room and made to kneel, Bucky just blinked at him.

One of the guards put the gun into Bucky's left hand. Bucky stared at it like he was trying to remember what it was for. Then he looked at Gekko, waiting to be told what to do.

"No," Steve said. He sounded so hopeless. Tony edged closer and put his hand on his back.

"Kill the sub," Gekko said.

Tony held his breath, knew Steve did as well. They were witnessing the last moments of Grisha's life.

On the screen, in a hell more than two decades gone, Bucky looked at Gekko, then back at the gun in his hand. He took a halting, painful step towards Grisha, then another, then a few more. Until he was at point blank range.

Then he just stood there, the gun hanging at his side like he'd forgotten he had it. He looked at Grisha as if the young man was a puzzle he could solve if he just tried hard enough.

"Kill him," Gekko ordered again. But Bucky didn't move.

One of the guards lifted his fucking cattle prod, the end sparking.

"No!" Grisha said, and amazingly the guard hesitated. "It's all right, Vanya," Grisha said to him. He looked up at Bucky and smiled, tears in his bright blue eyes and nothing but love in his expression. He bowed his head in clear submission, resting his forehead against Bucky's abdomen. "I love you."

Bucky stepped back, confused, but he still wouldn't lift the gun.

The guard shocked him, despite Grisha's begging the man not to. It took Bucky a few minutes to get back to his feet. This time when Gekko told him to kill Grisha, Bucky put the gun to the sub's head. 

There were tears in Bucky's eyes when he pulled the trigger. Tony wondered if he even knew why.

The screen went black.

"That's got to be it," Tony ground out. "Please tell me there's no more."

"No, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. said. "But the files indicate that Sergeant Barnes was sold to Hydra within the year. Apparently the memory wipes he was subjected to were so severe he was no longer able to function as a spy or trainer after that point. Hydra used him exclusively for assassinations."

"He fought so hard they destroyed him," Steve said. He looked wrecked, but there was awe as well as grief in his voice.

"If I may say so, captain," J.A.R.V.I.S. said, I am more sorry than I can express that your Dom was forced to endure that."

"Me too." Tony cleared the tears out of his eyes with the side of his hand. "God, Steve. I'm so sorry."

Steve nodded, then swallowed. "I've got to find a way to help him."

"He needs to see that," Tony said. "He needs to know that he tried to save those subs, not hurt them."

Steve nodded. He finally released his death grip on the dented table and rubbed his face with his hand. "I shouldn't've kicked him out last night. He needed me and I was a selfish asshole."

"Hey, speaking as a card-carrying selfish asshole, if someone walks away from you enough times, eventually you're gonna stop following, right? And I've seen Bucky walk away from you. Like, literally." Tony put his hand on Steve's shoulder. "You didn't know what was going on, before. You do now."

"Yeah," Steve said thickly. "God, I don't even know where he is right now."

"Good point. J? Where's Bucky?"

"I'm afraid he specifically requested I not relay his whereabouts, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. said. "But Agents Romanoff and Barton have also been looking for him."

"What?" Steve said. "Why? What happened?"

"I'm not at liberty to say, captain. But I am able to inform you that he is extremely agitated and…" There was a pause while J.A.R.V.I.S. monitored the cameras wherever Bucky was. "Sir, captain, this has now become a health and safety issue. Sergeant Barnes is in the garage on the lowest level and I strongly believe he is deliberately doing himself harm."

* * *

Steve knew he shouldn't've leaped at Bucky even as he tackled him to the dirty concrete of the garage, but it was an immediate, instinctive reaction to what he'd seen: Bucky screaming like an animal as he methodically smashed his fists against the nearly indestructible garage door. The need to get the man he loved away from the danger was too strong, even if the danger was caused by Bucky himself.

He twisted his body so he forced Bucky away from the door and onto his back, doing his best to keep him from hitting the floor too hard. He tried especially to keep Bucky from hurting his right hand more than he already had.

Bucky yelled something incoherent and hit Steve in the side of the face with his left fist, sending him reeling. Bucky followed it up with a brutal kick that blasted him into one of Tony's cars. It skidded sideways a couple inches from the impact.

Steve dropped to his knees and looked up in time to see Bucky almost on top of him.

He threw himself out of the way then rolled back up to his feet. "Stay back!" he warned Tony, who'd run into the garage right behind him.

"Bucky! Bucky, stop! It's me!" This felt far too much like when they fought on the bridge, and especially on the helicarrier. Bucky might only be using his left hand, but Steve had no illusions about how badly this would end if he couldn't bring Bucky back from wherever he'd gone in his head. "Bucky, you're safe. It's me. It's Steve. I'm not going to fight you."

Bucky yelled something in Russian, tinged with as much fear as rage, then came at Steve again. This time when Bucky swung with his left hand, Steve pivoted and grabbed his wrist, then forced it up behind his back, sliding his other arm around Bucky's throat. He tightened his grip just enough to force Bucky's head up, making sure he could still breathe.

"It's Steve," he said again. "You're in Avengers Tower, Bucky. You're safe. I'm not going to fight you."

Bucky stopped struggling. "S-Stepan?"

Steve let him go. "Yeah, Buck. It's Steve. I'm right here."

Bucky looked at Steve, then around at the garage, then at his hands. His eyes widened, and whatever he said in Russian sounded small and broken and afraid. He started shaking, clutching his wrecked right arm to his chest. Then he swayed and his legs gave out.

"No!" Steve leaped forward but froze, not wanting to do Bucky more damage. Tony ended up being the one who caught Bucky around the chest, though he didn't lower him to the floor so much as fall on his ass and take Bucky with him.

Steve disentangled Bucky from Tony, who scrambled away. Bucky slumped against Steve's chest with his head on Steve's shoulder, his hands palm-up and half-open, like dead birds on his splayed thighs. His right was a red, pulpy mess. He was panting, his hair damp against Steve's cheek. He kept murmuring in Russian. It sounded like a plea.

"It's okay, you're going to be all right," Steve said. He looked up at Tony's huge eyes. "He needs a doctor. I think he's in shock."

Tony snapped his gaze away from Bucky's crushed hand. "J? We need the docs, pronto. And tell Nat and Clint we found him, if you haven't already." He stood and jogged to the dented Porsche and took a first aid kit and a thermal blanket out of the trunk. He unfolded the blanket and lay it over Bucky, then knelt silently next to Steve and pulled a wad of gauze and roll of medical tape out of the kit.

Bucky hissed when Tony picked up his right hand, but didn't try to pull it back. He was still speaking Russian, low and desperate and sad.

"Lay him down," Tony said. "Fucking hell, he's bashed it to shit. I can see pieces of bone."

Steve carefully lowered Bucky to the floor, then used the kit to prop up his feet.

Tony used the tape to wrap a thick wad of the gauze over Bucky's knuckles. "I'm not even sure there's any point to this," he murmured. "If he were a regular guy he'd have crippled himself. Damn it." The gauze was already wet and red. He added another stack and started taping that. "What the hell is he saying, anyway?"

"Sergeant Barnes is apologizing, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. said.

Steve shifted Bucky's head to his thigh. "Apologizing? For what?"

"For everything."

* * *

"I owe you an apology."

"No you don't."

"I do." Natasha was sitting next to Bucky's bed in the tower's infirmary, holding his right hand. Normally injuries like his would require surgery, but with his healing ability and how quickly he burned through anesthetic there hadn't been much point. All the doctors could really do was remove bone fragments from his knuckles. Right now his hand was in an elaborate splint that looked like a large, plastic mitten. He'd insisted he wasn't in pain, but he'd flinched a little when she'd taken his forearm. "I should've realized that you weren't ready." She lifted her head, made sure to look him in the eyes. "I'm sorry, James. I should never have let the scene happen."

Bucky frowned. "It was my choice, Nat. No one forced me. It has nothing to do with you."

"Clint's my sub, which means that under certain circumstances, he's my responsibility. So yes, actually, it has everything to do with me. That's why I'm here and he isn't."

"Clint didn't do anything wrong, Nat. Neither did you. I asked him. I told him I wanted it. It's all on me." Bucky's voice was heavy with a kind of exhaustion that was terrifying. Clint had sounded like that after the battle of New York. Steve had sounded the same when he came to her for help. And now Bucky: like just taking the next breath was almost too much of an effort to be worth it. "I should've known better." He tilted his head back and closed his eyes.

"Maybe," Natasha murmured. "But so should I. Clint's my sub."

"Still my choice, Nat."

She didn't answer, because she'd learned a long time ago when to abandon an argument. Instead she replaced his right hand gently on his thigh. He didn't react, but she could tell by the tiny twitch of his jaw that he was in pain. "You should have more painkillers."

He shrugged with his left shoulder. "They don't really work on me. It'll heal either way."

"It'll heal faster if you're not in pain."

He didn't reply to that, which was answer enough: _I want to be in pain._

"What are you punishing yourself for?"

Bucky's eyes flew open and he turned his head sharply to look at her. The wariness in his expression made her certain he'd deny it. But then all he did was let out a breath, as if he'd lost the will even to lie. He swallowed. "Steve was my first sub. Did you know that? I mean, he wasn't my first scene. And I dated other people for a while. But he was the first and only one I ever really wanted."

"Clint was mine."

Bucky nodded like that wasn't surprising. "Thing was, my family was real traditional. My dad kneeled next to my mom at the dinner table, gave up his job to look after us, that kind of thing. And my mom, the day I realized my dynamic, she told me: it didn't matter what any of the books or my school friends said. The only thing that a Dom had to worry about was giving their sub what they needed. That was it. Everything else could be negotiated, but that one thing was sacred. A Dom gives their sub what they need. No matter what." He patted his chest with his left hand. "I took that to heart, you know? You do what your sub needs. Always." He smiled, wistful and sad. "Steve needed to fight, nearly always. He couldn't settle without it." The smile turned into a grin. "He'd have this…this _look_ he'd get, when he wanted me to settle him down. This kinda sly smile, like he'd been planning something. And I knew, the second I asked him anything, he'd say, 'make me'."

Natasha smiled as well, imagining Bucky reacting to Steve's insolence with fondness instead of fear. "I'm surprised you accepted that kind of rudeness." 

Bucky shrugged. "I know. My mom nearly had kittens, first time I brought Stevie home as my sub and she saw what I let him get away with. Part of it was he didn't know better. His dad was a sub, but he'd died before Steve was born. His mom raised him by herself, worked herself into an early grave looking after him. She was tough as nails, taught him to never kneel for anybody who didn't earn it. And he decided that meant he was gonna fight tooth and nail to make sure his Dom earned every scrap of submission he decided to give." He smirked. "And believe me, I earned it. God, the little punk loved pushing me. I'd have to hold him down, pin him until he settled. And then he'd smile at me like I'd brought him the moon."

"And then he was given the serum," Natasha said.

"Yeah." Bucky swallowed. "And then he was given the fucking serum."

"What did you do, when you couldn't hold him down anymore?"

"I tried," Bucky said softly. "After Azzano, he was…. I wasn't doing so well, but he was worse, I think. I mean, I'm—I was his Dom. I was the one who took care of him. Don't get me wrong, he wasn't helpless," Bucky added quickly. "He's the most capable guy I know. But…"

"You were his Dom," Natasha finished for him, because of course she understood.

"Yeah," Bucky said on a breath. "Yeah, I was. And when he found me…I think it scared him. To see me like that. Vulnerable like that. And he'd thought I was dead, right up until he heard my voice. And then everyone was looking to him to lead them and treating him like _he_ was a Dom. But he wasn't. And it hadn't mattered back in the States, because he was just an image there. A face on a poster. But at Azzano, the whole fucking war, it mattered. He had to pretend."

"That must've been difficult." Natasha knew exactly how much.

Bucky nodded. "So. He needed me to settle him. But I couldn't. He wasn't even fighting me, he needed it so bad. But he was just…. I couldn't hold him down." He took a shuddering breath. "Steve asked me to use my belt. Hit him with it. And that's not…it's not a big deal, right? Doms do that all the time. But…not me." He swallowed. "Not us. I'd never hurt him. Not ever. Nothing on purpose. But he needed it. And you give your sub what he needs."

Natasha shifted the chair a little closer and took his hand again. She wanted to hug him, but she doubted he'd let her. At least she could hold his hand. "What happened?" She wasn't sure she wanted to know, but Bucky had stopped speaking again and she didn't want him to get lost in his head either. There were only so many bones left to break.

"What happened is that I whipped him within an inch of his fucking life," Bucky spat. "I just…lost it." He shook his head and she could see his jaw move like he was grinding the memory through his teeth. "I was so fucking angry. For getting captured and tortured, for getting drafted in the first place, when I just wanted to take care of him. For the whole fucking war. And I was so angry at Steve," his voice dropped, like this was a confession. "Because he'd gone and volunteered when I'd told him not to. When I'd wanted him to be _safe._ Because he'd agreed to be a lab rat so he could put himself in danger. Because he'd changed his body so I couldn't hold him down anymore. And I was angry at myself, for agreeing to hurt him even though he needed me to. For not being strong enough to do anything else.

"So I went nuts," he went on softly. "I don't even know how many times I hit him. Can't remember. Can't remember what made me stop. We were out in the woods, 'cause no one could know Captain fucking America was a sub. But we were still close enough that he couldn't scream, because someone would've heard it."

"He could've stopped you. Safeworded," Natasha said.

Bucky just shook his head again. "He didn't. Not even when he was bleeding. He told me later it was because he figured I needed it. Needed to hit him." Bucky actually gagged. "I was his _Dom_ , Nat. And I…. And he _let_ me—" He stopped, clenching his jaw until the muscles bunched with the strain. "I failed him so badly."

"You gave him what he needed," Natasha said simply. "The fact that he chose not to stop you isn't your fault."

"I swore after that I'd never hurt him again," Bucky went on as if she hadn't spoken. "I went to Peggy Carter, asked her to teach me how to fight someone taller and heavier than me." He smiled: wistful and momentary, but real. "She was one hell of a Domme. We'd settle Steve together, when we could. She loved his insolence as much as I did. And she helped me relearn how to give him what he needed without doing him harm." He watched his left hand open and close, open and close, over and over again. "Funny thing is, I didn't know what Zola had done to me yet. I was getting stronger all the time, but I didn't notice. I just figured what Peggy taught me was working. 'Cause it did." He smiled, but it was a small, ugly thing. "Right up until I died on him. That probably hurt him a bit."

"That wasn't your fault either."

He shrugged. "The result was the same." Bucky lifted his metal arm, wiggling his fingers. "And you know what they did to me."

She nodded.

"I'm kind of broken, Nat." His voice had flattened to a sort of terrible calm. "I thought maybe…maybe it could fix me, being with Clint. He's a great sub. I hope you tell him that."

"Yes I do," Natasha said. "But, James, you're wrong. You're not broken. You're not broken and you're not irredeemable, and you didn't do anything wrong with Clint. The only thing you did wrong was to hurt yourself. If you wanted pain you could've come to me."

"It's not the pain, Nat. I don't like pain. Never have."

"Punishment, then. What else was it?" she demanded when he shook his head. "You crushed your hand!"

"It was a reminder," Bucky said. "I'm not a Dom anymore. I just hurt, even when I don't want to." He raised his right hand, as if in demonstration. "Maybe this way I won't forget again."

* * *

"Where the hell are you going?"

Bucky closed his eyes and let out a long, silent breath of frustration. "Out," he said to Steve, not looking up from trying to tuck his laces into his boots. Turned out even that was fucking difficult with only one working hand. He should've asked Clint to bring sandals along with the jogging pants, but whatever.

"You haven't even been in the infirmary a full day!"

Bucky shrugged, then made himself sit up and look at Steve. "Not exactly your business, considering you kicked me out."

"Oh, fuck you," Steve snapped. "I was the one who scraped you off the damn garage floor last night. I think that makes it my business. Seriously, how far do you think you'll get, without a right hand?"

Bucky folded his lips into something he hoped resembled a smile. "I've gone pretty far with worse injuries than this."

That just made Steve look angrier. Whoops. "I really don't give a shit." He went from looming in the doorway to leaning against the frame with his arms crossed. He cut a beautiful figure like that. "And I didn't kick you out. I said I thought it was time one of us moved out."

"Right." Bucky snorted. "'One of us' should move out of your apartment. Wonder who?"

"It's not just my suite," Steve said. "It's both of ours. At least, I thought it was." He pulled in a long, slow breath. "I wanted it to be. You didn't."

Bucky wanted it too. He just didn't deserve it. But he couldn't say that. "You said we weren't friends."

"Are we?"

Bucky nodded. "Yeah." His voice was too rough and he had to swallow. "Yes we are."

"Then will you talk to me?" And fuck if Bucky hadn't walked right into that one, fucking idiot. Steve's eyes were huge and blue as the sky, so much pain in them that it could've gone on forever, and all of it Bucky's fault. "Please? Will you just talk to me?"

Bucky opened his mouth and then closed it helplessly again. He shook his head. "You can't help me. The only thing you can do is walk away. I want you to walk away." He tried like hell to sound like he meant it.

"I can't," Steve said simply. "I know that you don't want me anymore, and I'm respecting that. But Buck, you can't ask me to walk away. I can't leave you hurting."

Bucky gritted his teeth. " _You can't help me._ "

"Well I'm gonna keep trying until it kills me," Steve said.

"Or what? Until I do?" Bucky stood up. "You think I don't want you? Huh, Steve?" He yanked his anger back like armor, rolling his left hand into a fist. "You think I don't want you?" He made a miserable little noise that was definitely not a laugh. "You have no fucking idea how much I want you. But I can't be with you. I _can't_. I'm just going to hurt you. That's all I do!"

"That's not true." Steve took a step toward Bucky. Bucky drew back before he did something really stupid like hug him.

"I almost beat you to death, Stevie." He had to force himself to even say it out loud. "I shot you. I stabbed you. God, I hurt you so bad—"

"And then you pulled me out of the river," Steve said, like that was the only important part. "And you weren't _you_. We've been over that. What they made you do, that's not your fault."

"Of course it's my fault!" he burst out. "Every single sub I had, that I was dumb enough to care about…they..." He had to swallow around the sudden ache in his jaw. "Anyone I got close to. Anyone I tried to take care of. They died, because of me."

"That wasn't you, Bucky," Steve said again, like repeating it enough times would be what made the difference. "That was the Red Room. They hurt those subs. Not you."

Bucky shook his head. "You weren't there, Steve. You don't…." He swallowed again. This was the last thing he ever deserved to cry about. "The truth is, I'm a bad Dom. No. I'm worse than that," he continued doggedly through Steve's wordless denial. "I'm like, poison." There was something viciously satisfying in finally admitting it, exposing the suppurating mess of his soul. "All my life, I was told to give subs what they need, right? And then I tried, and...And they just got hurt. They died. Because of me."

"No, Bucky. That's not true! I…." Steve opened his mouth, then just closed it again. He looked away, carding his fingers through his hair. "I saw the films. Of…of your punishment."

Bucky gasped, rearing back like Steve had just hit him. "You _what?_ " he breathed, as if Steve repeating it would make it untrue. _He saw it. He knows. He knows._ His heart was suddenly pounding and he couldn't get enough air for it. He couldn't breathe.

"Bucky! Bucky, listen to me. You're safe. You're here in Avengers Tower and you're safe. Nothing bad is happening to you. It's 2014, you're in Avengers Tower and you're safe, Bucky. Bucky? Are you with me? Do you know where you are?"

Bucky was sitting on the end of the infirmary bed, clutching at Steve's shirt with his working hand. He had no memory of getting back there, but at least he knew where the hell he was. He let go of Steve immediately. "Sorry."

"Don't apologize." Steve loosed the grip he had on Bucky's shoulders. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Bucky. I shouldn't've watched it without your permission. But, you…" He let out a sad, miserable breath. "You're so convinced that you're bad. God, you just said you were _poison_." Steve reached for him again, but Bucky flinched. Steve dropped his hands.

"If you saw it, then you know. You know what I did." He kept his hands on his thighs, eyes down. "You know what I did."

"I did see it. I saw how much you fought. I saw how hard you tried to help them." Steve cupped the side of Bucky's face, telegraphing the move. Bucky let him, but he didn't look up. "They had to wipe you three times before you…. Before what happened to Grisha, to make you obey them. They'd been forced to take so much of your personality away that they sold you to Hydra, because they couldn't use you anymore. Can you hear that? They sold you like an animal, because you fought so hard they had to destroy you to get what they wanted."

Bucky tilted his head away from Steve's hand. "You're wrong. I didn't fight them. I just let it happen."

"No. That's not true!" Steve insisted, like a dog with a goddam bone. "I saw it. All of it. I saw how much you cared about those subs, Bucky. How good you were to them."

Bucky burst out laughing.

"You think I'm good?" he demanded. "You think I'm _good_ , Stevie? Like I've ever been a decent Dom?" He shook his head, still laughing. There was an edge of hysteria in it. "You got no fucking idea."

"Of course I do! You always did right by me! Jesus Christ, Buck." Steve reached for him again, but then just fisted his hands at his sides. "I would've been dead ten times over it if it wasn't for you."

"I'm not talking about that." Bucky shook his head, curling and uncurling his left hand. "That was mostly your mom, anyway."

Steve frowned. "My ma didn't win my fights for me, or pay our rent half the time. You took care of me when I got sick almost as much as she did. And then it was just you, after she died. I'm only here now because of you."

"And then the second I couldn't hold you down anymore, I fucking belted you bloody," He slapped his chest with his left hand. " _That's_ what I really am, Steve. That's all I ever was! Why can't you see that? Why are you so fucking blind that you only ever see things the way you want?"

"I don't!" Steve yelled right back. "Damn it, Bucky! Why are _you_ so blind you can only see things the way _you_ think they are?" He took a couple deep breaths, calming himself down. "I never should've made you do that, I know." He looked off to the side, rubbing the back of his neck. "Things were never the same again, afterwards, and I know it's 'cause I made you do something you hated. I won't ever ask you for that again, okay? I shouldn't've in the first place."

"You didn't do anything wrong," Bucky said, anger draining in the face of Steve's guilt. "I was supposed to give you what you needed. And instead I just…." He swallowed. "I failed you."

" _No,_ " Steve ground out. "You did not fail me. You have _never_ failed me. If anything, I failed you! I never wanted you to give me what I needed at that kind of cost to yourself. Jesus, Bucky, you were allowed to say 'no'!"

Bucky shook his head, scowling. "I wasn't going to say no when you were going nuts. It was up to me to control what happened. Keep you safe. And I didn't. I didn't." Bucky closed his eyes, shuddering at the memory. "Your back looked like I'd taken a razorblade to it."

"Bucky, will you listen? Please? I—"

"And the thing is," Bucky spoke right over him, "the thing is…I think all the Red Room did was...find that part of me. The part that ripped you up 'stead of doing what you needed. They found it, and let it out. But it was always me. And I never wanted to hurt you, Steve. Not like that. You're everything." He was crying, damn him. "But all I ever do is hurt you."

Steve stared at him. "You're wrong. You've never hurt me."

"Sure," Bucky snorted wetly. "I shot you then almost beat you to death."

"You stopped as soon as you realized who I was."

"No." Bucky shook his head wearily. "The only reason you survived is 'cause the glass broke."

Steve frowned. "I know what happened. I was there, too, Buck."

"You were half dead!"

"You weren't any better."

The hint of pride in his voice just made Bucky angrier. "You should've made sure I was completely dead, asshole, instead of leaving me healthy enough to smash your face in!"

"You didn't know who I was," Steve repeated, then shrugged like how close he'd come to dying didn't matter. "Hell, you didn't know who _you_ were. But you still stopped."

"I _didn't_." God in heaven, only Steve could ever get him riled like this. "You think I don't remember? You told me to finish it, for fuck's sake! _And I was going to._ I was going to!" 

"No Bucky," Steve said gently. "You stopped."

"I didn't! Stop saying that!" Bucky yelled. "I _hesitated._ That's not the same thing. You're not hearing me. That's what I am, Steve. The only reason I stopped belting you was when I realized the leather was wet because it had your blood on it. And on the helicarrier, you would've died. I don't know why I hesitated. But if I hadn't, you would've died."

Steve closed his eyes for a moment, took a breath like he was steeling himself. "You did stop, Bucky, I swear. But…I think I know why you're so sure you didn't." He reached behind him and unsheathed a knife from his belt. He handed it to Bucky, hilt first.

Bucky took it, holding the hilt in his left hand and balancing the tip on his right. There was a trace of blood like rust near the tip, as if the blade had been wiped down but not cleaned. He looked up at Steve. "Is this my field knife?"

Steve nodded. He looked miserable. "Your spare. I took it back from the Smithsonian, along with most of your things that your family had kept. I'm glad you remember it, Bucky."

Bucky nodded distantly. "Why do you have it? Whose blood is this?"

"Mine."

"What?" Bucky fumbled the knife and it fell to the floor. "Why the hell is your blood on it?"

Steve bent and picked it up, sliding it back into the sheath. His cheeks pinked, something Bucky normally found cute, except now Steve was looking anywhere but at Bucky's eyes. "I…use the knife. Sometimes. Sometimes I…need it."

"I don't understand," Bucky said. But it was like part of him already did, with the way his heart was pounding.

Steve grimaced. He went to the side of Bucky's bed and snagged the chair, then set it down in front of Bucky and straddled it, crossing his arms on the backrest. He kept his head down, eyes on the floor. The pose was submissive with contrition. "Mostly, I don't need it," he said quietly. "There've just been a few times in my life when…when the way you usually settled me wasn't enough. Like when my ma died. Bleeding helped."

Bucky blinked, then gaped at him. " _That's_ why you kept getting into fights? I thought you were too upset to keep your mouth shut."

Steve shrugged. "That was part of it, sure. But the rest was that it hurt. A lot. And the wounds bled."

"Why didn't you ask me?"

Steve lifted his head just enough to look at Bucky's eyes through his lashes. "I didn't ask you because I didn't even know I wanted it. Not really. I just knew I felt better after getting into a brawl. It wasn't 'til after Azzano, after I'd thought you were dead and then you weren't but you'd been tortured, and suddenly I was _Captain America_ , and everyone thought I was a Dom and that I had all the answers but I didn't—!" His voice had steadily gotten louder, until he bit it off at a near-shout. He dropped his head again, like the beautiful, perfect sub he'd always been. "You belting me, making me bleed like that…it was so good, Bucky. It was exactly what I needed. I didn't tell you to stop because I didn't want you to."

"What?"

"After that it was fine again," Steve went on while Bucky was still reeling. "Until you fell. And…" He swallowed. "And Peggy would've helped, I know. But, there was no time. We had to stop Schmidt. And it wouldn't've been good without you anyway." Steve closed his eyes tight for a moment, and when he continued his voice was like sandpaper. "I could've gotten out of the plane, Buck. But I thought…I took it down, I'd get to be with you."

"Oh my God. Steve."

Steve shook his head. "But I didn't die. I woke up, and everything was different and, and wrong. And you weren't there. And I knew you would've wanted me to find somebody else. But I couldn't. I didn't want any Dom who wasn't you." He drew in a shuddering breath, but finally lifted his head. "So when one of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who'd been assigned to me told me about the Smithsonian, I got your stuff back. And I got the knife. And I started using it."

"Oh my God," Bucky said again. "How long? How long, Steve?"

"A few times," Steve said. His gaze slid away from Bucky's again, telegraphing his guilt. "Not that often, really. Mostly I was too busy to need anything. And the missions helped. The fighting. I was all right. Not…happy," he added haltingly, like it was a confession. "But, all right."

"And then I came back," Bucky said, bitter. He didn't say that Steve would've been better off if he hadn't, because he knew Steve would deny it to his grave. "Your sorry excuse for a Dom who almost beat you to death."

"No." Steve glared. "You gave me what I needed. That's why you don't remember that you stopped hitting me on the helicarrier. Because you've always given me what I needed, and I needed that." He sounded absolutely certain. "I needed my Dom to hurt me." He smiled crookedly, his eyes wet. "And you did. Even when you didn't know your own name, you knew that you're my Dom. That's why I told you to finish it. Because I didn't mind if it was the end of the line, as long as I was there with you."

Bucky could barely speak. "You wanted me to kill you?"

Steve went still for a moment. "Yes I did," he said, rough. "When I lost you, I had nothing. I had nothing left to live for. I put that plane down into the ice because it hurt less than living without you. And then they dug me out, and woke me up. And you weren't there and it hurt worse than anything I'd ever known. I endured two years like that, and then you came back but you didn't know me. And I did want you to kill me, so I didn't have to live through losing you again. I'm so fucking sorry for that, Bucky," he said, pleading. "It was so unfair and so wrong of me, to make you do that. But I didn't even know that…that was what I wanted until you had me on the glass, and I realized that if I got up, I'd have to go on without you, again. And I couldn't. I can't, Buck. Please don't make me." He wiped his wet eyes, then blinked more tears onto his cheeks. "I'd rather die."

"I don't understand," Bucky said. "Why did I stop, then? Why didn't I give you what you needed?"

Steve smiled at him like a flower turning to the sun. "Because you wanted me to live."

Bucky's breath cracked, then broke, and then he was hunched over and crying like an idiot, trying to hide his face with his hair and metal hand. "I do," he gasped out. "I do. So much. I'd rather die than hurt you. But I already did. I'm so broken, Stevie," he sobbed. "You keep saying I can be fixed, but I can't. I can't. I don't know how."

"We'll find a way," Steve said, with that kind of certainty that Bucky both admired and hated. "There're people at S.H.I.E.L.D. who can help. Or Sam, or someone else." Bucky heard Steve standing, and then he was enveloped in his arms, crying against Steve's chest like all the worst sub stereotypes they'd ever laughed about. "But I can't keep doing this, Bucky. I can't watch you tear yourself apart. I thought Clint was helping you, and I hated that it was him and not me. But I was still glad, because you need someone so badly."

Bucky shook his head. "It was for you," he choked out. "It was his idea. That maybe if I could be with a sub again, I could be with you."

Steve gently wiped away his tears. "We'll find a way, Bucky. We can make this work, as long as I can be yours. We can do anything."

"Please, don't let me hurt you," Bucky begged. "Even if you need it. Not like the helicarrier. Please don't do that again."

"I won't, I won't, I promise. We can take every precaution you want. Anything."

"Thank you." Bucky swallowed. "I really fucked up my hand, Steve."

"I know. Stay here and let it finish healing, please?"

Bucky took a breath. "Is that something you need?"

"Yeah," Steve said immediately. "I need to know you're not in pain."

"Okay." Bucky pulled away slowly, then toed off the boots. He climbed completely onto the bed and sat there cross-legged. He was exhausted, he realized: the kind of shivery weariness that came after a surge of adrenaline. He'd always hated it. "So what happens now?"

Steve didn't answer. He was still standing at the foot of the bed, and now he deliberately climbed on to it, one knee at a time. Bucky watched, heart hammering, as Steve tucked his feet together, put his hands on his thighs and bowed his head. Kneeling.

Kneeling. But, not quite. Bucky wasn't standing. Steve's head was even a bit higher than his. It was still submissive, but not…not terrible. This was more like when Clint had knelt for him. The world didn't go white.

It was a tiny, pathetic kind of triumph, but he would take it. He had to.

"Lie down with me?" Bucky hated the uncertainty in his voice. He should be telling Steve this, not asking him.

But Steve's head snapped up, his eyes wide with a fragile, tentative joy. "May I?" he asked, whispering like he barely dared to hope.

Bucky was still afraid, wasn't sure right then if that would ever change. But he wanted this, he wanted Steve, so badly. And he remembered how it felt when he hadn't been scared, when being with Steve was as easy as breathing.

So he just cocked an eyebrow and said, "You gonna make your Dom repeat himself?"

"No, sergeant." And God, if the way Steve looked at him, like he'd just given him the whole fucking world, didn't make it worth it.

Bucky lay down and shuffled over then rolled onto his side. Steve lay down on his side as well, and Bucky immediately threw his right arm over his chest. It was a little uncomfortable with the stupid splint, but he didn't care.

It'd been easier to hold him like this when Steve was little, before the war. But even after Steve changed they were close enough in size and height that they'd been able to make it work. Bucky tucked his nose against the back of Steve's neck, breathing his scent and feeling the heat and strength of his body.

"You're mine," he said. "You're mine and I won't let anyone hurt you." He meant, _I won't let anyone hurt you, including me._ He didn't know if that was a promise he could even keep, but he still said it.

And Steve said, "I've always been yours." And, "I know. I know you won't." And Bucky held him tighter and decided he'd take that triumph too.

* * *

They showed him the films.

Not immediately; not even soon. Bucky finally allowed Steve—and S.H.I.E.L.D.—to find him a counsellor first. She was an older, round cinnamon roll of a Domme named Annette, who'd helped the survivors of Loki's mind control. When they met she shook his hand and told him smilingly that she had a lot of experience with people being stubborn in their self-loathing.

She asked a lot of questions that Bucky hated to answer, but he did. It felt like ripping off his skin, sometimes, telling her anything. But he didn't want to be afraid anymore.

Annette came with him, when he felt as ready as he ever would be to see what had actually happened to the subs, as opposed to the disjointed, guilty horror he'd pieced together in his memory. Steve stayed with him too, even when Bucky insisted he didn't have to see it twice.

"I want to be here with you," Steve said simply. "If you want me to leave, I will. But I'm all right. I don't need protecting from this. What I need is to be with you."

Bucky could have ordered him to leave, as his Dom, but he didn't. Steve needed to stay, and you gave your sub what they needed.

Nothing would change that, though Bucky was trying to accept that he could do what _he_ needed, too. Right then, he needed Steve to stay as much as Steve did.

So, he sat on the couch of the common floor with Steve practically in his lap, and his counselor in an armchair as a silent pillar of support. And they watched the Red Room torture and murder three subs only because Bucky had loved them. And he saw how hard he'd fought to protect them all, and he remembered.

"That doesn't look like a bad Dom to me," Annette said, a long time after J.A.R.V.I.S. shut off the screen. "That's actually about the finest example of protective dominant behavior I've ever seen."

"She's right, Buck." Steve handed him another couple tissues. Bucky had been so wracked with grief and anger that he'd given himself a fucking nosebleed. "You saw that, right? You got to have seen that. That was you, up there. All you. They had to strip you down to nothing, to make you do what they wanted. And even then, you were a good Dom. You never lost that."

Bucky nodded, swallowing thickly. "I didn't even know what I'd done wrong."

"You hadn't done anything wrong. That's why you didn't understand. You actually did everything right, and they punished you for it. To control you," Annette said.

"You've always been a good Dom, Bucky," Steve said. "You're the best. I love you."

"You too." Bucky wiped his nose, then scowled at the tissue. "I'm bleeding like a fucking faucet."

"It's not that bad," Steve said.

Bucky snorted, scattering more blood on Steve's shirt.

"A nosebleed is nothing," Annette said cheerily, sliding over yet another box of tissues. "I've had clients puke and burst blood vessels in their eyes." She smiled warmly at him. "I like to think of it as the body's way of getting the poison out."

"I'll bleed to death," Bucky said. But he liked thinking of it like that: like he was shedding the blood the Red Room and Hydra had forced onto his hands. Becoming clean.

"You're too strong to die from that," Steve said.

Maybe he was.

* * *

"Bucky? Bucky! Answer me! Are you okay?"

Bucky opened his eyes, giving Steve a faintly puzzled smile. "Yeah. I'm fine." He tugged on the cords for his earbuds, popping them out of his ears. He flipped them over the handle of the treadmill then turned the machine off, going from running flat out to jogging to an easy walk until he was just standing, panting a little and leaning with his crossed arms on the dashboard. "J.A.R.V.I.S. told you I was here, right? Is something wrong?"

"You had your eyes closed, and I didn't think you heard me. I thought you might've…." Steve trailed off, grimacing. "I'm glad you're all right."

"I'm fine," Bucky repeated. He grabbed the towel he'd left hanging over the side bar and wiped his face, then scrubbed his hair to dry it. "I knew where I was, and if I go down the rabbit hole again, J.A.R.V.I.S. will talk me out or get one of you if he can't." Steve already knew this, of course, and he couldn't've forgotten it because he couldn't forget anything. But he still looked keyed up and unhappy. "What is it?"

Steve carded his fingers through his hair, then left his hand on the back of his bowed neck, so that he looked up at Bucky through his eyelashes. His cheeks pinked.

Oh. _Oh._

Bucky slowly climbed off the treadmill to stand in front of Steve. There was still fear there, in the drumbeat of his heart; maybe there always would be. But he knew it for what it was now: the remnants of terror that had been forced on him, but nothing he'd earned or deserved. It got a little easier to shove it aside every time.

"You want something, Stevie?" he asked, lowering his voice.

Steve shivered, then nodded.

Bucky grinned, all teeth, knowing what was coming. "You gonna tell me?"

Steve lifted his head. His eyes shone but his smirk still had uncertainty in it. This was still new, the two of them relearning each other. That was getting easier too, though. And when Steve said, "You gonna make me?" there was no hesitation at all.

"Maybe I'll beat it out of you." Bucky froze for a second, startled at his own words. But Steve lit up like Bucky had given him a promise instead of a threat.

"Maybe you'll have to catch me first!" He whirled and ran before he finished speaking.

Bucky gave him a second's head start then tore after him, pleased that Steve headed straight for the room where he practiced throwing his shield.

The floors in here were padded, so when Bucky tackled him prone to the mat neither of them broke anything. Steve tried to scramble away, but Bucky straddled him and hooked his feet over Steve's legs, then clamped his hands around Steve's wrists and yanked his arms behind his back, shoving them up until he heard Steve grunt in discomfort. He adjusted his grip until both Steve's wrists were trapped in Bucky's left hand, then he grabbed a handful of Steve's hair with his right, pulling back until Steve's head was off the floor.

Steve went boneless as a warm cat.

Bucky lowered Steve's head back to the mat, petting his hair now instead of pulling. "Yeah, that's right. That's what you wanted, huh? I got you. I'm right here." Bucky kept up the litany until he could tell by Steve's breathing that he was settled, then he let go his wrists and gently placed them at a comfortable angle at Steve's sides. He massaged the back of Steve's neck and his shoulders and arms, pressing out what tension remained.

By the time Bucky finished Steve was more asleep than awake, but he still managed a soft grumble when Bucky climbed off him. He didn't protest at all—or help—when Bucky got him sitting up so he could hold Steve in his arms. Steve lolled against him, loose and dreamy.

"Is this better, Stevie? Did you get what you needed?" Bucky asked him softly.

"Mmm." Steve patted Bucky's nearer leg, smiling dopily. "Yes, sergeant," he said slowly, slurring a little. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." Bucky kissed the top of his head and held him more tightly, his heart filling at Steve's contented sigh. "I love you."

"Me too," Steve murmured. He nuzzled Bucky's neck. "My Dom."

"That's right," Bucky said. "I'm yours. Always." 

**Epilogue**

He was right about the yard in front of the barn making a decent dancefloor, Clint thought happily. With the lights and the speakers, it'd been one hell of a great evening once the sun went down.

The ground was dry and the fall night was nicely cool but not cold. Right now Clint was on a blanket he'd spread on the ground, lying between his two Dommes and watching them lazily kiss above his head. Most people assumed one of the women was a switch, since two Dominants together was almost unheard of. Clint knew how much both his Dommes had suffered for their orientation, but once Natasha felt safe in S.H.I.E.L.D. she refused to hide that part of herself anymore. And Laura never had. It was one of the many, many things Clint loved about both of them.

"Get a room!" Tony catcalled from the other side of the fire pit. 

Pepper and Bruce shushed him immediately, and Pepper made him apologize. Clint quietly grinned to himself, then scooched backwards so he could sit up. He made puppy-eyes at Laura until she laughed and kissed him too.

"You're terrible," she murmured over his lips.

"Yes, mistress."

Thor was still on the makeshift dancefloor, trying to teach Jane the steps to a courtly dance he'd apparently learned as a child. He was having a hard time showing the leader's steps instead of the follower's.

Bucky and Steve had each taken a reclining lawn chair. Steve had his arm over his eyes, but Bucky was watching Thor and Jane intently. Finally he reached some kind of breaking point, because he stood up in a huff and stomped over to Thor, who blinked at him.

"No, no, that ain't it." Bucky shook his head. "You keep doing the wrong moves." He turned to Jane. "Can I borrow him for a couple minutes? I'm pretty sure I know what Thor's trying to show you, but the big lug keeps getting it backwards."

Jane looked bemused, but she smiled. "Please, go ahead."

"Great. Thanks." Bucky smiled at her, then took both of Thor's hands in his. "All right, so the leader starts with their feet like this, right? And then you step to the side…."

He began a very slow version of Thor's dance, pausing every so often to make sure he had the steps right. Thor was delighted, nodding and beaming.

"It's like a slow waltz," Natasha said, watching. "Do we have any waltz music?"

"J. Waltz," Tony ordered lazily. He'd set up the sound system, so of course a waltz started playing immediately.

"Thanks," Bucky murmured, concentrating on leading Thor as he practiced the steps he'd just learned. Bucky was just as amazing to watch as he'd been to dance with, and Jane was more than smart enough to follow along. Pretty soon she took over and did a credible job of leading Thor, who was trying to hum along to the music but couldn't stop grinning long enough.

Laura watched them, delighted, then stood and offered her hands to Natasha and Clint. "Come dance with me?"

Clint had no idea how they'd manage with all three of them, but it'd be a kick to try. And it wasn't like he'd deny his mistress anything.

Pepper let Bruce demur, but she all but hauled Tony to his feet and dragged him to the dancefloor. Tony kept complaining that he had no idea what he was doing, but still somehow made it look effortless. 

Bucky shared a grin with Clint as Clint passed him, towed by his Dommes. "Hey, Stevie!" Bucky called, "come dance with me."

Steve stretched luxuriously before turning his head towards Bucky. He grinned. "Make me."

It was almost hilarious, the way everyone stopped to stare at Steve and then at Bucky. A hush dropped on the crowd like a brick, everyone waiting to see what Bucky would do.

Steve blinked at the sudden attention, then seemed to realize what he'd just said. He all but leapt off the recliner then stood, his eyes bouncing to everyone's face before stopping at Bucky's. He looked like he didn't know if he should kneel in apology or run for it. His mouth opened and closed a few times like he was trying to figure out what to say, but then he just swallowed, put his shoulders back and lifted his chin.

Bucky for his part looked shocked for all of a second, then stalked right up to Steve. "You talkin' back to me in front of everybody, punk?" The low menace of Bucky's voice was belied by the way he couldn't seem to control his grin.

Steve didn't even try to stop the enormous grin that split his face. "Guess I am." He closed his hands into loose fists at his sides, but he was all but bouncing on his toes like a puppy. It reminded Clint of himself when he was showing off for his Dommes.

"Guess you are." Bucky's grin was entirely feral, and his fingertips were twitching like he was just as ready for a fight as Steve. Even then, when Bucky made his move it was so fast that Clint barely caught it. All of a sudden, Steve was just laying across Bucky's shoulders, his leg and wrist trapped by Bucky's left arm. "I'm afraid you'll have to excuse me, everyone," Bucky said formally as they all gaped at him, "But it seems my sub needs a reminder on manners. We'll be in the Quinjet if anyone needs us." He started walking away, then swung around, moving as easily as if he were carrying a bag of feathers and not a 200-plus pound super soldier on his back. "Please don't need us." He swung around again, giving a perfect view of Steve trying and failing really badly to hide his grin against Bucky's shoulder.

"Well," Laura said, watching Bucky march away with his apparently perfectly willing cargo. "I have to say I did not expect that."

"I did," Natasha said. "Something James told me," she explained when Laura arched her eyebrows.

"So, uh, was that a good kind of caveman moment?" Tony asked. "Or do we have to rescue Steve from the Arm that Time Forgot?"

"It's good, Tony, don't worry," Natasha said. She smiled softly at Clint and gently squeezed his hand. "Not the worst idea you've ever had, _zvezda moya_."

Clint beamed.

 

END

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, we're on Tumblr! [Taste_is_Sweet](http://taste-is-sweet.tumblr.com/) and [Shazrolane](http://shazrolane.tumblr.com/). Hello!
> 
> (And if you're interested, you can read more about Taste_is_Sweet [here](https://about.me/aundreasinger). ♥)


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